


With Friends Like This, They Should Call Me Sinatra.

by Subtlemagic



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Mob, Angst, Drama, Drug Use, Established Relationship, Everyone is in the mob, Implied/Referenced Drug Addiction, M/M, Mafia Victor Nikiforov, Mentions of prison life, Romance, Russian Mafia, Underage Drug Use, Yakuza, Yakuza Yuuri Katsuki, because he's an angel., does the & symbol signify that it's only friendship?, except otabek, like all the angst..., otayuri friendship, seriously though
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-03-05
Updated: 2017-12-10
Packaged: 2018-09-28 12:18:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 25,525
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10100351
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Subtlemagic/pseuds/Subtlemagic
Summary: Victor is the direct heir to the Russian mob in London, Yuuri is part of an opposing faction of Yakuza in the west end. The two are constantly fighting over territory and trade, except in their private lives where they're anything but enemies.But when you throw in Victor's trouble making nephew (recently released from prison on drug charges) a missing suitcase of pure grade cocaine and a crooked cop who may be less crooked than it first appears, their romance is going to be far from smooth sailing.





	1. Chapter 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Victor's nephew is finally free, except Victor knows that that's not true.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here was I thinking that if I wrote a story for Yuri on Ice I would avoid the drama and angst of my last few stories. But oh no, apparently I can't write a single piece of fiction without torturing the poor characters... I'm a bad person.
> 
> Also this first chapter is really just a bit of background/exposition. We'll get into the main story (and accompanying romance) later.

Victor had been too young to really understand what had happened to his older brother. He never really knew anything about his sister in law either. Despite the haziness of their memories though, Victor had the undeniable evidence of their love in the form of the angriest tiger cub the world had ever seen.

He had only met the kid when Nikolai had been hospitalised with a heart attack, and with nowhere left to turn had put Yuri into the hands of his other grandfather, Yakov. Victor understood that his brother had wanted Yuri to avoid the family business entirely, but once Yakov had got his claws in Yuri - who was the spitting image of Victor’s late brother - there was no turning back.

The evidence of Victor’s failure to protect his nephew from their lifestyle was walking towards him through the secure doors of the Young Offender’s Institution. Yuri was dressed in his normal clothes again, a fact for which Victor was grateful. He didn’t think he could have stood the sight of Yuri in prisoner’s overalls.

The leopard print jacket on the other hand, made Victor smile in recognition. Yuri kept his grimace, but almost smiled at the young officer who patted him on the back as he left. Makkachin was growling at the sight of police, as she was trained to do, but couldn’t keep up the pretence when Yuri walked towards them. Makkachin had missed the boy almost as much as Victor had.

“What are you doing here, dick?” Yuri snarled, “I didn’t ask for anyone to come get me.”

He smiled as Yuri pushed away at Makkachin’s face, trying to avoid getting slobbered on. “As if Father would let you leave here on your own.” Victor explained, calling the poodle back to his side. “How would you get home anyway, Yurochka? I know you didn’t call anyone else.”

“Well once you’ve finished being Daddy’s little golden retriever. You can fuck right off, And don’t you dare fucking  _ Yurochka _ me, you left me in there to fucking rot. I’ll make my own way home. It’s easy enough to get a taxi from here now I’ve finally got my phone back. Which you  _ also _ didn’t help me with.”

“I’ll save you the fare,” Sarcasm bled through every word as he opened the door to let Yuri into the car, but the boy didn’t move. “If you’re not in too much of a hurry to get away from here…” 

Yuri was silent, and Victor knew that it was at least partially his fault if not completely his fault. He could have saved Yuri a lot of time and pain if he has just ignored his father, if he had been paying more attention to Yuri in the first place, but he hadn’t. As much as Yakov liked to complain, Victor really did do everything he was asked. “How was it by the way? Are you alright?”

“Four months of trying to avoid getting raped by the big kids in the shower... It was just like summer camp. What the fuck did you think it would be like asshole?” Yuri growled, not so much of a little cub anymore, Victor mourned internally.

“No need to be crass Yura.” He tutted, but he didn’t feel as calm as he schooled his face to be. He had avoided prison himself, as the direct heir, Yakov had helped him out immediately the one and only time he had gotten arrested, but he had heard stories. Psychotic, angry, love starved and touch starved teenagers locked together with the heavy weight of puberty and posturing covering every inch of the building. A pretty kid like Yuri did well to come out unscathed.

“I’m not being crass. I’m not exaggerating.” Yuri didn’t hold back on the anger that he felt and Victor knew it was justified. “Do you know how much I had to name drop to avoid getting shanked, what I had to do to keep myself safe in there on a daily basis? Do you have any idea? No of course you fucking don’t, because Yakov got you out of that hell hole as soon as he was able. But me? Of course _ I  _ wouldn’t be worth the money to actually hire a lawyer. He let me go to  _ prison _ Victor. Like it was nothing, like I was being  _ grounded _ .”

“You  _ were _ being grounded Yura. What the hell were you doing holding in the first place, you’re supposed to stay above all that. You know you’re next in line after me, and you were  _ using _ too. What kind of message would that send?”

Yuri’s laugh was dry and mirthless, “Yeah, like we’re the fucking royal family. I wasn’t even pushing Victor, I was literally just holding it for one of the other guys. And I used  _ once _ to prove a point.”

“You went into  _ withdrawal  _ when you were in that place Yura, you had to fucking  _ detox _ . You might not have been using for very long, but it was definitely more than once. You think you would have avoided getting in too deep if Yakov hadn’t let you serve time? If you do you’re fooling yourself. You’re only fifteen for god’s sake. What kind of punk dealer would even be suicidal enough to sell to you.”

“Who says I wasn’t just stealing from the company stash?” He’d tried to smirk as though he was as confident as his words, but it was a very thin cracked mask. The tears had been welling in the corner of his eyes the second he had gotten out.

Victor gave him a pitying look. Yuri hated it, “You say that as if Yakov doesn’t account for every microgram that comes through our doors.”

“Maybe I just knew the right people to blow to get the books changed.” He sneered, he always enjoyed pissing Victor off, and there was nothing better than being crass to get what he wanted.

“You always love to pretend you’re older than you are, Yurachka.” His fault again, he knew. It hurt so much to know how badly he had failed to follow his brother's wishes. How much he continued to fail. “You’re just a kid, little one. And that’s okay, you’re allowed to be a kid with childish notions of love and sex and life. You don’t have to pretend to be like them, like  _ me _ . Just stay innocent for a little while longer.”

Victor knew knew that Yuri was sobbing now, though he gritted his teeth to stifle the sound. ‘ _ He wouldn’t let Victor see how much it affected him being in that hell hole. Nearly all of the people Yuri knew had served time in some form or another, he couldn’t be seen to be the weak one. He knew they already called him the Russian’s Fairy Princess. The inmates would be watching him cry from the windows if he didn’t control himself soon _ .’ Victor could see those sorts of thoughts like a cloud around Yuri’s head. Victor couldn’t fix that, couldn’t make the pain go away, but he could hide his nephew from view. He wrapped him up within the confines of his large coat, tucking him under his chin and let him cry.

“I want to see grandpa.” Yuri mumbled into Victor’s shoulder, no doubt taking some delight in getting snot all over his thousand pound Givenchy shirt. Clutching his fingers into Victor’s lapels so he wouldn’t walk away.

“I take it you don’t mean, Yakov.” Victor whispers into the blond hair, pressing a soft kiss on the crown.

“Fuck your old man.” Yuri whispers back, though without much bite. "He's a cunt"

“You should try being raised by him." Victor almost started to laugh, but then stopped. He knew it really hadn't been any better for his grandson. "I know Yura, I know. I’ll take you there.”

He would have to take Yuri back to Yakov eventually. Yakov would shout and ask if Yuri had learned his lesson like he was a toddler who had been sitting on the naughty step. Yuri would be angry again, and desperately upset, but silent because he knew what might happen if he spoke out. Victor would bite his tongue and then take Yuri to a safe space so he wouldn’t be tempted to dose up into oblivion to avoid the reality he found himself in. Maybe Yuri would be open enough to cry in front of him again. Maybe, he would take it out on Victor. Maybe Victor would sneak him back to Nikolai’s for the night.

They didn’t have to think about that yet.

“Let’s go” he said stepping back, “I’ve got better things to be doing, if you know what I mean.” He wiggled his eyebrows suggestively.

“If you’re talking about that Yakuza piggy, I swear to god I will pee on everything you love.”

He got into the car with a slam of the door before he plugged in his headphones. He didn’t turn his music on, so Victor assumed he was allowed to talk, as long as Yuri was allowed to pretend he couldn’t hear him.

“He’s hired Lilia to look after you by the way.” Victor mentioned as casually as he could manage, but Yuri’s head snapped around to stare at him wide eyed.

“What? Why? I thought he told the hag that she wasn’t allowed anywhere near me.”

Victor shrugged, but smiled anyway. He had hoped that Yuri would be happy with the news. Wrapped in angry layers as it was, Yuri was definitely still happy. “Being a ballerina is better than being a strung out junkie, I guess. I never understood why he was against the dancing in the first place. I thought you were brilliant.”

“I don’t want to do it now that he approves, what’s the point in that?” Yuri spat out and then bit his lip, but Victor knew that he would take that back the moment he was within walking distance of Lilia’s studio. He couldn’t contain the brightness in his eyes, the excitement at the very thought of it.

“I’ll let you in on a secret.” Victor fake whispered, “He doesn’t approve at all. I told him that your babushka would be tutoring you in ‘proper’ Russian. He doesn’t like the mob slang you use either.” Yuri snorted at the idea of ever calling Lilia his babushka to her face.

“He doesn’t like anything about me very much does he?” Yuri eventually commented, and gave a toothy cocked grin, if there was one thing that boy loved more than pissing off Victor, it was showing Yakov what he thought of him.

“Hmmm.” Victor pretended to contemplate, “The love child of Yakov’s oldest and dearest son. The main reason that his precious heir ran away along with a primary school teacher, who then disappear leaving only a note that Yakov’s own grandson is to be left in the care of some unknown baker. Now the aforementioned love child has been making his life difficult since he turned up uninvited at age eleven… I wonder.”

Yuri laughed at that and Victor was glad for it. It would have been all too easy for Yuri to never laugh or smile again, for him to have been completely broken for the past few months, but he was holding it together far better than Victor ever would have.

“He does love you, you know.” Victor tried to offer, but he knew that it wouldn’t be well received. Yuri didn’t reply again, but Victor couldn’t exactly blame him for that.

“Hey, and an added bonus. You know that Lilia won’t want to be within a hundred yards of Yakov, she’ll pick you up in the mornings and you can go straight to her studio until the mid afternoon. I figured if you and Lila can do whatever you want to do in that time. Be that grammar or a properly executed fouette turn.”

“What do you know about fouette? Don’t pretend like you know the first thing about Ballet.”

“I’m majestic as fuck and you know it.” Victor countered by moving his hands into poor imitation of fifth position.

“Keep your hands on the steering wheel, idiot!” Yuri screeched.

Victor laughed and put his hands on the wheel as Yuri muttered to himself about the irony of surviving prison only to be killed in a car crash by his stupid half-uncle who couldn’t even work out how to hold a stupid steering wheel. Only with a lot less polite language.

“I don’t think there’s such thing as a half-uncle.” Victor commented mildly, “If you’re going to call me that I’d prefer to just be Victor.”

“Whatever,” He finally turned his music on a stared out of the window, so Victor couldn’t check that he hadn’t just imagined things when he thought he heard Yuri mutter a quiet ‘thank you.’

They arrived before too long at the little bakery along one of the many little streets behind the SOAS buildings and Victor parked up, paying for the parking before opening the door to let Yuri out, before Victor could open the door, Yuri had run into the shop and thrown himself into his grandfather’s arms, letting himself be held tightly.

“Yurochka,” The old man’s voice was like home, even though he was no relation to Victor, he wished he had been, the man was so kind and loving, “How big you’ve grown. Oh, but what did they do to your beautiful hair?”

“It’ll grow back, Dedushka.” Yuri said softly, but Victor could hear that he was crying again. “I missed you.”

“I missed you too. I’ve just finished making piroshkis, they’re still hot if you want one.” Yuri couldn’t speak, but he nodded.

“You’re welcome to stay too, Vitya.”

Victor wished he could stay, either that or he could leave Yuri here with his grandfather and never come back, but he knew that neither situation would end well for everyone involved.

“I would Kolya, but I’ve got some errands to run.”

“I understand,” the old man smiled sadly at Victor, and he knew acutely, that the worry he felt for Yuri, Nikolai felt for him in turn. He was grateful for it, but it would never help. Once he left through those doors he wouldn’t be Vitya anymore, he would be Victor Nikiforov.

He hardened his heart, and left.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Quick note on the family tree.
> 
> Yakov and Lilia had a son who is Yuri's father. Nikolai is Yuri's mother's father. Victor is Yakov's second son by another woman (and the source of Yakov and Lilia's divorce). So Victor is Yuri's half-uncle on his father's side.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Victor comes home to Yuuri.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apologies if I don’t use the yakuza/bratva terms correctly. Whilst, I did live in Japan for three years, surprisingly mob speak wasn’t a part of my daily vocabulary! And I speak absolutely no Russian whatsoever. Blame wikipedia if this is all wrong!
> 
> Also AngstTM is turned up to 11. Also also there is blood and mentions of violence, be warned.

“Thank you, Krestniy Otets. I can’t tell you how important this will be for our community, we were in desperate need of protection after  _ they _ moved in.”

“Don’t let Yakov hear you say that, Victor is fine, Vor if you wish to be polite.” Victor filled in his notes, he didn’t know who  _ they  _ were, but it was a catch all term for any syndicate that weren’t Bratva. It could have been anything from Triads, to Yakuza or even the Firm, although no-one really acted anywhere in central London without the Firm’s say so, especially not out east. It was why the west end territories were so valuable, worth protecting, worth fighting over.

“Vor then,” The man inclined his head in respect, “I wouldn’t dream of being so informal. May I ask, if it’s not too much trouble, when we could expect assistance?”

Victor looked over his ledger books and time sheets, all encoded of course, before sighing deeply. There were never enough soldiers around to look after the number of people in the community who requested help, but how could they justify taking protection money if they didn’t protect people? That was just inviting one of the bigger groups to come in and change people's loyalties.

“We’ll bring along the Boyaviks, they’ll scope the area out and report back to me. We’ll see where we have to go from there.”

“Thank you so much,” the man all but whimpered, “Thank you.”

Victor dismissed his snivelling gratitude with wave of his hand, and consulted his book again. The man walked backwards towards the door, not wanting to turn his back on Victor. Whether that was fear of exposing his back or whether it was politeness, as though he were the fucking Queen, Victor didn’t know nor care.

“Mila” he shouted through the door.

She came in giving him a unimpressed dressing down with her eyes, as she was so easily able to do. “You done being the big boss, Vor?”

“I was hoping you would tell me; is there anyone waiting?” He put the last of his notes in order and locked them away as securely as possible. He wasn’t going to risk anyone finding them, even if they were encrypted.

“No one waiting, and nothing left to do today that won’t wait until tomorrow. You’ve got rounds to do, but you don’t have to complete those until tonight, in fact tonight might be better.”

“Obviously,” He tried to give her his most winning smile. She was never swayed by it, but it didn’t hurt to try. “Thank you, Mila. I don’t know what I’d do without you.”

“Probably get laid a lot less.” She smacked his arse as he walked past, “Go on, get going to that secret beau of yours. You know, it would be easier if I knew who he was.”

Victor gave her a dismissive wave in response, and wrapped himself up warm against the cold winter air, before leaving the office without another word.

“Fine!” she shouted after him “I’ll find out who it is eventually!”

He laughed loudly at her insistence, it was a long standing joke between the two of them, but internally Victor dreaded the inevitable day where she made good on her threat. It was bad enough that Yura found out who his lover was when he accidentally picked up Victor’s phone in the middle of the night. If anyone louder, or less open found out their relationship, it could start all out gang warfare. Victor was lucky that Yura didn’t care about the Bratva and certainly didn’t put much store in syndicate loyalty.

Victor walked as far as he could to make sure that he was being followed before taking a cab from outside the local station, surreptitiously checking that it  _ wasn’t _ one of the cabbies who worked for any of the gangs, (the man seemed to be cockney through and through, possibly Firm, but they didn’t care about small time groups like Victor’s). Then and only then could he breathe. At least now he would be on his way home, his real home, the one he shared with his love and his dog and his real self.

~*~

“Zolotse, I’m home.” Victor called up the stairs, the sound of Makkachin scrambling to the door was like music in his ears, but for once it wasn’t accompanied by the sweet calls of his lover.

It was at this silence that he bounded up the stairs two at a time to their bedroom, perhaps Yuuri was having a nap, or maybe he had his headphones in and was too focused on the winter olympics, or something else entirely, but as he opened the door to their bedroom, he knew that it wasn’t the case.

“Zolotse?” Victor whispered, scrambling to meet Yuuri on the floor, he was ashen faced, his body was crumpled into an uncoordinated pile of limbs. It was the blood that shook Victor to his core. It was everywhere, all down Yuuri’s shirt, coating his hands. “Are you hurt?”

“Don’t Zolotse me, Victor. Not now.” Yuuri’s words were shaky, but not laboured, not his blood then. At least it wasn’t  _ all _ Yuuri’s.

“Funny,” He tried pointlessly to lighten the mood, “You’re not the first person to say that to me today.” The silence beat against him. “Will you let me help you into the shower at least?”

Yuuri made no movement, not to answer, not to stand up, but not to pull away from Victor’s grasp so he took that as something of a positive. “Jesus, Yuuri. It’s everywhere, what the hell happened?”

Yuuri shook his head, and Victor thought he was going to stay silent again, but eventually the shocked stillness of his face transformed into great bawling sobs. “Minami got stabbed, he’s... He’s just a  _ kid _ . He’s under my protection Victor. And he just… I couldn’t even stop it happening. I only saw the guy run away. He’s  _ seventeen _ .”

“Is he…?” Victor couldn’t bring himself to finish that sentence, too awful to even put into words. Minami was a punk like all of the Yakuza brats, but he was a good kid, never got into anything too dangerous and worshiped the ground that Yuuri walked on. If anyone deserved such a fate less, Victor didn’t know them.

The silence that stretched on let Victor fear the worst, before he noticed Yuuri shake his head. “No, he’s stable in the hospital now, though he’s being kept in a medical coma. He was in surgery for  _ three hours _ , and all I could do was sit in the waiting room and hope. I couldn’t even offer my blood up for a transfusion and…”

“You should have called me, love. I would have been there in a heartbeat.”

“You know I couldn’t have,” Yuuri finally looked him in the eyes then, anger and remorse heavy and in equal measure, “we play our little games here, where it’s all nice and safe and I can pretend that having you believe in me, believe in  _ us _ is enough, but could you imagine what it would even be like if you had turned up. I mean  _ really _ imagine it.”

Victor tried for a while, in his mind he would run up to Yuuri through the locked doors behind the surgery waiting area, Yuuri would practically be jogging on the spot waiting for the door to open and they then would fall into one another. Yuuri would be crying, because of course he would, then Victor would tuck him under his chin and would curl into his shoulder, he would kiss his hair and they would have waited together for Minami to come out of surgery. Perhaps Victor could have even donated blood in an emergency; he was a universal donor after all.

Except that it would never have happened like that. Yuuri would not have been there alone, his family would be there as well as any of their group who could spare the time. If Victor walked in their relationship would have been immediately discovered, causing someone to probably kill Victor where he stood. That was if he got far enough into the hospital without being spotted by the members of the clan who would have been guarding every door to protect the head family. If they got out of the building alive, they would have been banned from ever seeing one another again. If they were lucky. 

Victor didn’t voice these thoughts, of course Yuuri would have come to the same conclusion that he had. Even kissing the top of Yuuri’s head was outside the realm of reality right now as he had blood in his hair from where he had probably tugged at it with his hands in frustration. In the quiet contemplation, Yuuri had begun to shut down again, he was staring at his hands with a deep and terrifying fascination.

“I’m going to draw you a bath,” Victor said, gently coaxing Yuuri into a standing position and taking him by those blood soaked hands until they reached the bathroom. Yuuri let himself be manipulated like a ragdoll as Victor carefully took off his shirt followed by the rest of his clothes and threw them in the washing basket. Yuuri sat naked, quietly waiting for the bath to fill. The silence between them was intimate, though not sexual. Victor gloried in the sight of Yuuri’s body normally, but it was a different sort of love that Yuuri needed right now.

He helped Yuuri step into the bath and sit down, where he immediately curled up again, folding in on himself. He wasn’t crying anymore, but Victor didn’t think that this was much better. He dipped a sponge into the water, took Yuuri’s hand in his own and gently scrubbed away the blood inch by inch, he gave a kiss to each fingertip and the palm once it was clean, then moved to the next hand, his arms, his chest, his face. Every single iota of Yuuri, every line of ink that traced his body, was treated with a reverence Victor had felt for nothing and no one else.

Once he curled his fingers into Yuuri’s beautiful hair, gently untangling it whilst working through the shampoo, his lover finally spoke again. “It was a Bratva kid.” he whispered into his pulled up knees.

Victor didn’t need to ask what he meant. It was one of Victor’s own underlings that had done the deed, who had covered Yuuri in blood and left an innocent teenager fighting for his life in the hospital. “I’m so sorry.”

“It’s not your fault.” he offered, though there was little effort behind it. It was like a reflex, one that Victor couldn’t stand. “You don’t control the movement of everyone your generals do that and then report back to you. I suspect you won’t even find out why until tomorrow.”

“Please,” Victor begged, “Please don’t pretend with me. This is terrible, and awful and of course I want to make it better, but we can’t survive if you bottle this up.”

“I hate you.” Yuuri said, and Victor felt his heart shatter in his chest. He couldn’t speak, couldn’t breath for long moments. His hands stilled to stop them shaking

“That’s a lie,” he continued in a whisper, “I  _ want _ to hate you sometimes, because everything would be so much simpler if I did. Then I could detach, but it’s too late for that, because I love you Vitya. I really do. I think though,” Yuuri took a shaky breath and turned to face Victor, “I think I hate Victor Nikiforov sometimes. Does that make sense?”

Victor nodded, and kissed Yuuri’s lips as softly as he had kissed every other part of him, “I think I hate him too. Sometimes I hate Yuuri Katsuki. Is that okay?”

“I don’t think any of this is okay, Victor.” He was crying again, it was an emotion at least, “But I’d rather have you hate parts of me than have you be completely indifferent to me.”

Victor didn’t have to tell Yuuri that he felt the same way, they worked together  _ because _ they  knew how the other felt, because they could trust one another to be honest. Victor only wished that their honesty didn’t leave such a bitter taste in his mouth. It wasn’t always this hard but the closer they had become, the more they relied on each other and the harder it became to live this separate life. Yet still Victor didn’t think he could bring himself to wish it any different.

~*~

It wasn’t always this difficult. It had started easy, deceptively so.

It was another night, another set of rounds stopping off at a new up and coming club that Victor had been thinking of taking under his wing. That was always the way with an up and coming club, it never remained mob free for long. Everyone knew who hung out where, who was allowed inside and who wasn’t. This place though didn’t have those rules written yet, it was a blank slate. He had arrived ostensibly to be looking for potentially business, but in hidden parts of himself he knew that this was as close to freedom as he would ever get and he sought it at every turn.

Maybe that was where it all started, with the need for freedom. He hadn’t even had to worry about bringing a large detail with him, he only had Yura and Georgi by his side. He had already seen Christophe in the club, working the stage as per usual. Perhaps this wasn’t an official strip joint, but Chris was undeniably good at what he did, and the stage was built for people like him.

In the back of his mind he wondered if the place had an sexual entertainment venue license, and Chris was the officially hired entertainment for the night, or if he just couldn’t be that close to a pole without his clothes falling off. Victor was settling on the likelihood it was the latter.

Chris didn’t work in new clubs, the man moved between well established clubs, many with mob links. Renowned as a miracle worker, he could take the grottiest aging relic, and transform it into the most popular place in the west end, quickly drawing in a fresh, more legitimate crowd. But it was  _ always _ the same story, a shady club would become Chris’s next gig, and then it would straighten itself out and any backroom deals would stop immediately. Victor prayed that he was the only one close enough to notice the pattern, Christophe’s employment history was a sure sign of Met Vice & Club’s undercover unit if he ever saw one. He didn’t want to find Chris in a gutter somewhere with his kneecaps blown out.

So instead he turned a blind eye and pushed those niggling little thoughts as far down as they would go. If it turned out that Victor’s best friend was a cop, then it would only appropriate; the universe had to show itself to have a sense of humour once in awhile, besides, Victor wanted to keep him around, better the devil you know after all. Except Victor wasn’t very good at lying to himself, he wanted Chris around because Chris was his best friend and confident. Whether he was actually a stripper or not.

Right now though, Chris seemed to just be drunk and having a good time, exactly what Victor should have been doing. He took his lead from the others and downed his double vodka immediately before calling for another. Despite what Yakov would call his appalling lack of Russian constitution, it took another round like that for him to start feeling fuzzy around the edges.

“Slow down, Victor.” Georgi warned somewhere to his right, Victor looked to his left to avoid Georgi’s judgement, but on the other side was Yura looking equally unimpressed. 

“What are you doing, idiot?” He spat, glaring daggers at him.

Victor  _ was _ starting to get a little stupid, because by rights he knew that Yuri shouldn’t have been sitting next to him. The kid was only fourteen, and definitely shouldn’t be in a club, strip or otherwise, but had no idea why he was there. He recalled that he’d snuck Yuri out of the house, with the promise that once he was sure that no one was watching, he would help him get to his grandfather’s house to stay the night. It wouldn’t be easy to get Yura back if Victor was wasted. So it was Victor's fault, again, that he was there and Victor’s fault, still, that he would be there for a while. At least Georgi was staying sober, he would get Yuri where he needed to go eventually.

He couldn't stand the scrutiny of the two who were sitting either side of him, so instead he focused on the stage ahead, where someone was being dragged on stage by Chris to ride that pole like a pro. Victor had been certain that the mystery man would simply walk away or laugh it off, but judging by his slightly wobbly steps upto the stage, and the immediate way he loosened his tie, he wouldn’t be backing down from that challenge. 

There was no finesse to his stripping, it was all practicality, but the audience wolf whistled and catcalled anyway. Victor could more than see why, he was all lean toned muscles with thighs for days, and as soon as he stepped up to the pole he and Chris were an erotic whirlwind of movement and strength that had Victor adjusting his trousers as surreptitiously as he could.

“He’s really pretty” Victor murmured at Yura, “Do we own him?”

“First of all, you’re a dipshit. Second,  _ no-one _ owns this club yet, of course you don’t own him. Third, are you fucking kidding me, are you really that drunk that you can't recognise who he is?” 

“Even  _ I _ can see who is, Vitya” Georgi piped up.

Yuri gave a vague exasperated gesture to Georgi as if to say, _see_ _even this idiot gets it._

“Who is he then?” Victor admired the beautiful form twisting and flipping around the pole. If they could get Victor a phone number that might be a good start.

“Just look at the tattoos for one second.” Georgi pointed out the panels of intricate interwoven colour covering a vast proportion of his back, chest and shoulders, spreading just onto those glorious thighs, the blank strip that ran from sternum to navel. Victor couldn’t see the details from here, but the shape was more than distinctive.

“He’s Yakuza, idiot.” Yuri scoffed once Victor had twigged.

“Definitely Yakuza. I think he might be the second son’s eldest son or something. Not quite at the top of the family tree, but definitely inner circle.”

“How do you know that?” Victor queried, maybe Georgi  _ would _ know his number.

“I don't know I just think I’ve seen him round before. Surprisingly enough I don’t make a habit of hanging around with the Katsuki clan.”

“I thought you said that no one owned this place, what's he doing here?”

“You don’t own it either, and you’re still here.” Yuri pointed out, “So before I punch you, I’m going to say this once more and you’re going to listen.  _ No one _ owns it, aside from you know,  _ the owners. _ He's probably the same as you, been asked to check the place out, see if it’s worth anything. Can I go home now?”

“I thought Yakuza generally stuck to more traditional endeavours, baccarat and the like. Gay bars aren't normally their scene.” Victor turned to Georgi ignoring Yuri’s request out of shame.

“Not exactly Yakov’s normal scene either.” he countered,

“I’m diversifying,” the double meaning in his words made him giggle to himself almost uncontrollably, but maybe that was just the vodka. “I’m going to get a closer look”

Georgi and Yuri shot each other exasperated looks as Victor left the table and walked towards the stage. “I’m taking Yuri home!” Hei shouted at Victor’s retreating back. That was good at least, one less thing that he didn’t have to worry about. One more promise he had only half broken.

The stage area was packed, but even those who didn’t know Victor seemed to know enough to make room for him. The man, from this close Victor realised he was stupid to not recognise the affiliation, didn’t seem to care about the stage or the people watching him lustily from the sidelines, it was only when he was standing on Chris’s outstretched thighs (and how the  _ hell _ did Chris have the body strength to do something like that) that he seemed to notice his audience, before smiling brightly and waving.

Eventually after a few moments he was panting and laughing as he hopped back down off the stage, starting to throw on his shirt again. Chris continued in a more traditional show which kept the rest of the audience enthralled, but Victor couldn’t take his eyes off the other man who seemed not to deem trousers a necessity. He thought that he was being discreet in his observation, that was until he got to the bar. Only to get a drink. Obviously. There was no way that he was strategically placing himself closer to the mystery dancer. The very notion was ridiculous.

If Victor thought he was being discreet though he was much mistaken. The moment that he stepped up to  _ maybe  _ order another drink (he shouldn’t have one, he was already more drunk than he ever allowed himself to be) than the man was staring at him from the other end of the bar, with a seductive, and equally inebriated smirk. He whispered something in the ear of another man before walking over Victor. It was a wonder how he had managed to dance so fluidly when he had barely managed to get to the other end of the bar without stumbling.

“I’m very thirsty after all that dancing, since you enjoyed it so much maybe you would indulge me, Victor?”

“Not a good way to open a conversation, you know who I am and I know nothing about you. Quite unfortunate don’t you think?”

“That was rather remiss of me, if you don’t know my name then how are you going to scream it later.” he licked his lips and winked with such blatent sexualty that Victor was too stunned, or perhaps too drunk to reply except with an mouth gaped in disbelief. 

“Don’t look so scandalised, I’ve been informed that it’s not all that uncommon in places like this. It’s why I came here, isn’t that why you came here?” despite the directness of the man’s words, there was an embarrassed blush playing on his cheeks.

“Maybe it’s just nice to have fun without all the goodfellas bullshit” Victor countered with his own flirty tone

“That’s exactly what I’m saying. Let’s forget the real world and just have fun, that’s what these nights are for.”

“Common occurrence for you?” he questioned, trying to sip his drink as nonchalantly as possible. A quick glance in the mirror at his flustered reflection let him know that it wasn’t working.

The man shook his head, the delightful blush deepening. “I’ll let you in on a secret: I’ve never been to a bar like this before. Maybe that’s why I wanted to talk to you. I know your stories, you reputation. Maybe I need a coach to teach me about how this world works. Come on  _ take me home _ Victor, coach me.”

He has never seen such raw want and sexuality from a person before, barely three minutes into a conversation with a complete stranger to be propositioned so  _ openly. _ It just didn’t  _ happen. _

“Maybe if you can meet me out the back in ten minutes then I could be all yours. No obligation, of course.”

Maybe indeed. Maybe this was this was a really bad decision, but he was too drunk to care.

~*~

Waking up the following morning in a ravaged hotel room, he had left a sleeping Yuuri  and his phone number behind. He hadn’t imagined that the other man would have completely forgotten that night. Nor did he anticipate the lengths that he would go to find a man who should have all rights been no more than a one night stand. Victor couldn’t bring himself to regret the effort he had gone to to find Yuuri again.

But he had been a fool to think that finding Yuuri was the difficult part. It had been so easy to fall in love, but that love was the most difficult and dangerous thing to happen to him. It brought with it a soft spot, a weak link in the armour that he couldn’t afford whilst still living in this life.

He used gentle hands and gentler words to help Yuuri stand up and rinse the last of the grime off in the shower.

“Victor,” He whispered, placing his now clean hand on Victor’s cheekbone. He leaned into that precious touch greedily, “Can you help me? Let me forget for a while? I need a little oblivion right now.”

“Promise me we’ll talk about this later.” he turned to kiss that palm once more.

“Of course I promise. Even if I don’t want to, help me, can  _ you _ promise me?”

“Always.”

Victor took Yuuri’s hand and they walked unhurried to their bedroom. There only lay between them a quiet building of heat, as he marvelled in the simple beauty of being near the person he loved with his whole heart. They didn’t speak except in murmured ‘I love you’s - they would save their words for the conversation they knew was waiting on the other end.

Every movement their bodies made together was slow and reverent. Victor explored with teeth and tongue the skin he knew so well. Victor sucked Yuuri into his mouth languidly and gradually, coaxing his erection with gentle caresses and soft lips until the only signs of Yuuri’s impending orgasm were the stifled whimpers and twitching thighs beneath his hands.

Victor had been willing to stop there, except Yuuri's had begged, pleaded for Victor to make love to him, to stop him feeling numb and detached. It was probably the worst idea, to use sex to feel something, but they both needed it, and it wasn’t as though they could seek therapy. So instead he poured his love and apologies and need into every touch, and was given the same devotion in return until, sated, they fell asleep.

~*~

The ping that woke Victor from his nap jolted him awake, he was only supposed to drop by on Yuuri briefly before starting his rounds, but several hours had passed. Yakov would be wondering where he was, he would probably be desperate to see Yuri again as well. Victor couldn’t bring himself to leave Yuuri’s side, except that was exactly what he would do. He would eventually be given no other choice.

He picked up Yuuri’s phone silencing it; Yuuri needed to rest.

The texts on the homescreen were all from Phichit. Victor unlocked the phone to work out what the other man knew, and saw in a few words the terror that his love had felt that afternoon. Yuuri’s texts to Phichit had been all but incoherent, asking him to come and help, to find out what happened but they had gone unanswered until that moment. Phichit was like Victor, in too deep with too many sides of these territorial disputes to draw attention to himself in the wrong company, but he was still Yuuri’s best friend and Victor had to respect him for that.

_ ‘Contact said Minami’s in with Guang Hong, it’s triad loot that went missing. They reckoned Minami was keeping mum.’ _

Dropping the phone onto his chest, he covered his eyes with his forearm, trying to block out what he had just seen, but it was already seared into his mind.

He knew moronic rumours like those got people killed all the time, he had just hoped that his own people had been smarter than to almost kill a kid because he happened to be the friendliest little thug the world had known, of course he was friends with Guang Hong, he was friends with  _ everybody _ . There was no clue in Phichit’s message as to what the missing gear was, probably drugs or guns if it was valuable enough for people to already start fighting over.

Yuuri stirred lightly next to him, but fortunately didn’t wake. Yuuri didn’t care for the life they lived, but Victor was more and more desperate to take the power that was promised to him. He didn’t want it for himself, it wasn’t worth the risk, but if he could gain the control back from the Avoritets he could lay down the rules of conduct that honourable men should keep.

  
As he looked at Yuuri’s face, more peaceful in sleep than he could ever be during waking hours, he knew he would do it, whatever it cost him. He would show them who was really in charge here. He would stop anyone from taking that peace away from Yuuri again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Meh, this was difficult to write. I’m not sure I’m a fan of it.
> 
> Krestniy Otets is a formal way to address the big boss of a Russian mob (or bratva), and means godfather. Vor means ‘forward’ or ‘thief’ and holds the same rank, or a very highly respected rank, but perhaps with less of the absolute authority of the godfather. A Bratok is a soldier, a step above newbie foot soldiers and a step below those with ‘military leadership’ responsibilities.
> 
> As for tattoos, both Victor and Yuuri as high ranking members are smothered in them. I picture Yuuri’s tattoos being of the very traditional Yakuza variety where designs start on the arms and shoulders and continue in straight panels down the chest and back and outer thighs leaving a gap in the middle. (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v123/supermaitro/image39.png)
> 
> He has mostly traditional designs, such as the Phoenix, demon and sakura/chrysanthemum designs, but on his arm is this design of a tattooed woman. (https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/e2/8d/d2/e28dd228b008f5a953206e6df66761eb.jpg)


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Yuuri wakes up alone, and starts looking for answers.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's been two months, since I last posted. I promised myself I wouldn't do that, but I was on holiday twice. Then it was exam season for all my delightful students. I'm not that sorry tbh. I should have more time to actually write regularly soon.

The silence that greeted Yuuri when he woke up rang in his ears like static. He was in his own bed, covers pulled up over his head. It was warm beneath his cocoon, but the other half of the bed was cold. He placed his hand on Victor’s imprint, hoping to take in some of  the lingering warmth, but it was long gone. The idea of Victor’s space, their shared space, was usually grounding, but now it didn’t give him the comfort slightest. It only served as a continuing reminder that Victor didn't get extenuating circumstances, he wouldn’t be able to take a day off for something as small as a teenager getting stabbed. Such things were par for the course.

On Victor’s cold pillow was a note in his distinctive looping cursive, ‘ _ I had to leave for my duties. I’m sorry, I didn’t say goodbye; I didn’t want to wake you, I suspect you needed the sleep. Hopefully I’ll be home before you can read this. All my love, always.’ _

Yuuri glanced at the window, but with the dying light in the winter, it could have been anywhere from 5pm to 8am and he wouldn’t have noticed the difference. He looked at his phone, squinting at it in the darkness, 9pm. Well, his sleep would be messed up for the evening, but he would suck it up, it was hardly the first time. Depending on what happened with Victor and his nephew, he might return in as little as one hour or not come back until the early hours of the morning. He hoped that Victor would try and return quickly to him, but it was as out of his control as everything else in his life seemed to be.

He couldn’t bring himself to leave the bundle of blankets, opting to forgo his glasses and just try and read the screen as it was.

_ ‘Contact said Minami’s in with Guang Hong, it’s triad loot that went missing. They reckoned Minami was keeping mum.’ _

It was already read, Victor must have picked up the phone when the message went off, Yuuri didn’t know whether he was pleased that Victor had decided to let him sleep rather than find out the truth, or pissed off. He hadn't done anything rash like delete the message or try to hide that he had read it, but Yuuri could have used a person to talk to about the whole mess.

Yuuri might have been the one to postpone their talk, but equally Victor had left without a word. They would have to talk about that too when Victor got back. Keep talking and everything would be fine, that was the one thing that they had to do to make sure that their relationship didn’t decay, rot from the inside like so many other things in Yuuri’s life. They made truth and honesty their staple, and it had served them well.

He stared at the text again. Was that the only reason? Something so small causing something so horrendously big? How was it always so easy, so terribly easy, to hurt other people to kill other people, and for what? Drugs, guns, money, were these things really worth the blood of another human being? Now Yuuri had gotten his answer he wished that he had stuck to his policy of never seeking them.

Yuuri didn’t like to rationalise these incidents very often, he actively tried to avoid it in fact. He didn’t want to be the kind of person who could bring himself to hurt others lightly, he didn’t want to be the kind of person who pretended there was a reason why people got hurt or killed. He had hurt others of course, he had killed others before too, but that was simply an unavoidable part of his life, and his family’s life. Not something he did regularly and definitely not something he did in anything other than the most extreme of circumstances.

He didn’t want to think on the reasons that the stupid, adorable kid was in a hospital. He hadn’t wanted to rationalise why Minami got stabbed. He didn’t want there to be a  _ why _ . If there was a why, then there might be a world in which things like happened to those who  _ deserved it _ . And when his mind got to the idea of people deserving pain, or suffering, or death, then he started to creep into territory that scared him more than the random acts could in the first place. There was a dark part of him that wanted to go and change the world by force. 

It was the part that was closest to the surface when he was with the head family, the part that thought that maybe he could run this show and teach everyone what it meant to fuck with Yuuri and those he cared about. It tore him apart to recognise just how easy it was to slip into that headspace, just how close he was to being one of the loose cannon hitmen that the head family had under their thumb. He could see how easy it was to become numb to killing and hurting others.

Victor said things sometimes when people got hurt, things like ‘they didn’t deserving the suffering they had gone through’. He had said it about Minami, that Minami hadn’t deserved to be hospitalised. Yuuri appreciated the sentiment for what it was, but when those things were said his mind couldn’t help but start spiralling. If he didn’t deserve it, then where there people who did deserve it? If there was the question ‘why’ then was there an answer?

If there was a why, then there was a logical retaliation, and he would be justified - no, compelled- to seek it out. He would follow that path to it’s bitter bloody conclusion. He would take the eye for an eye, the tooth for a tooth, if they pushed into his world by an inch then he would take them for a mile. Their land, and their neighbours land, everything they had, and he would raze it to the ground.

Yuuri was scared of himself far more than he was scared of anyone or anything else.

He  _ had  _ to think that such things were random acts. There was no retaliation against a random act. There was nothing to be done except heal and carry on. When lightning struck you didn’t spar with the sky, or take arms against the storm. That’s how Yuuri had to think of it, that’s how he kept himself under some semblance of control. He was seen as a relatively weak and unimportant member of the syndicate, he would be very unlikely to be in line to inherit as he already had numerous cousins who would be ready to take up the family name with pride, patriarchal lineage be damned, even if the line did move to Yuuri’s father, He would condeed the line to Mari in a heartbeat. It was a good disguise.

It was better this way, he couldn’t risk anyone seeing the true potential that he had held within himself. Victor had seen it, and that was more people than he had ever wanted to know his truth.

Yet he had asked Phichit to find out what had happened. That was already too close to the why. Phichit was a good person to know, sweet and honest and able to find out anything about anyone for it, he knew everything about everyone, and despite everyone knowing this, he seemed to have this inherent immunity that Yuuri couldn’t fathom out, but those eyes saw all. He didn’t want to give Phichit reason to look any closer.

But still, why had Yuuri asked, was it to stop it happening again? That’s what he had to tell himself, but some part inside said that he needed to follow the path of retaliation and screw the consequences. He wouldn’t do it, he couldn’t do it. He had to be the person that Victor believed him to be, the slice of normality they kept themselves human through.

A suitcase of something though, something important and expensive. God, he dreamed about this sort of stuff all the time. Duty was how Victor phrased their lives, not a job, not a career, not even just making money, but a  _ duty _ . Something that had to be done, whether he liked it or not.

Yuuri didn’t have duties like Victor, not in the same way, not the same extent. Yuuri had loyalties of course, he had his pledged his affiliation to his uncle’s family and syndicate, as had everyone else, when he had been far too young to understand what that meant. Mari had understood what it meant and took the family name with pride, despite being the second tier family, she was hugely respected and hugely influential. Yuuri in contrast was a leader in title only. He was too determined to be friends with his underlings. If one of Mari’s foot soldiers got stabbed she would be upset, but she would move on quickly, there was always another waiting to take their place.

Duty, such a loaded word. One he could so easily shed and abandon, no one would miss him, and yet he was now bound here by a duty that wasn’t even his own. He understood the weight of duty more now than he ever had in his life, because accepting Victor’s duty was now Yuuri’s own duty. As a lover, as a friend, and as the person Victor wanted to spend his life with, Yuuri had to be there to accept and conceed to Yuuri’s duty.

This duty was worse than anything, because it was self imposed. Victor would never hold him to such notions, Yuuri was only obligated to stay as long as he wanted to stay. Perhaps this, this moment would be his breaking point. Not something that Victor did, but something that Victor couldn’t do, not something that he was but something that he had no choice but to be. Yuuri was just tired of it all.

He hit reply on Phichit’s text,  _ ‘Meet me at the usual place in half an hour,’ _

~*~

Yuuri arrived at the ‘usual place’ with 5 minutes to spare, but Phichit had still managed to meet him there, The usual place was a little nondescript Costa inside a bookshop, there was little chance of worrying about affiliations when dealing with chain brands.

Phichit waved enthusiastically at him, the idea of discretion and keeping a low profile seemed lost on Phichit. Perhaps why he got away with being such a good finder of information; no one would expect the necessary discretion from him.

“Yuuri!” he called, as though he might not have spotted him, and didn’t stop waving until Yuuri was directly in front of him. Phichit was blessed more enthusiasm than Yuuri could muster up this late in the day. “Coffee?”

Yuuri smiled and gave his friend a hug in greeting, but couldn’t find the words he wanted to say, especially not out in the open like this. The two of them turned inside and walked through the eerily quiet bookshop, where only a handful of patrons were milling around during the late winter hours.

The coffee shop was equally devoid of life, except for the lone barista who was using the lull in business to furiously scribble notes from a mathematical mechanics textbook onto flash cards. He looked up shocked that he had been asked to actually serve a customer, and immediately turned back to his revision once the drinks had been made. 

“So why did you want to meet up?” Phichit asked bluntly, stirring the abundance of whipped cream into the syrupy monstrosity he had ordered.

Yuuri looked carefully over Phichit’s shoulders to the barista who was far to engrossed in furious scribbling to pay attention to anything the two of them were saying. “I got your text, about Minami.”

“How is he by the way? I didn’t want to enquire too much when you were in the hospital, figured you’d want some breathing space.”

“He’s fine,” Yuuri would have to face up to talking about it soon enough, his sister would want to know what happened at the very least, even if the head family didn’t care over much about someone of Minami’s status. “Well, of course he’s not fine, but he’s stable and it’s not caused any damage that will be long term as far as the doctors can see right now.”

“That’s good to hear.”

Yuuri lapsed into silence, focusing on the gentle flip of pages from the frantic barista. The gentle chatter of people walking in the street below. He couldn’t hear what they were saying yet, but he could probably focus in if he paid attention, catch the snippets of a normal life.

“Yuuri?” Phichi was waving his hand in front of his face, trying to get his attention. “Meeting? Minami? What did you want to talk about?”

“Sorry, I got distracted for a moment.”

“Obviously,” Phichit placed a hand over Yuuri’s own across the table, “I’ll tell you whatever you want to know, but you’ve got to ask the questions. You know my rules.”

“I know, I know.” Phichit’s rules had kept him safe for this long, they might seem ridiculous to Yuuri but he had to respect them. He breathed in deep and held his breath for a few seconds before letting it go slowly. “Okay, let’s get to it then. A suitcase? Can you tell me anything about it?”

“What do you want to know?”

“What’s in it, how much is it worth, who does it belong to, who’s after it now? Anything about it that you can tell me.”

“I’ve not found out what’s in it yet, but it’s already on the radar of a few people, so suffice to say it’s probably worth a pretty penny. Rough estimates from this kind of interest, plus this level of gossip, and the fact it’s apparently a single suitcase, maybe 1 to 2 million sterling. Probably wouldn’t say it was more than that though.”

“Kona maybe? If they could get a full 32kg through it would be worth that much. That small a package for that much money couldn’t be any weapons.”

“I agree, and it explains the Russian involvement.” Yakov’s people cornered the market, and didn’t take lightly to potential interlopers.

“Have you heard anything about its whereabouts yet, or maybe when it went missing? How easy would it be to find?”

Phichit sat back up, raising his voice above a murmur for the first time since they started speaking. “You answer my question before I answer yours. Why are you so interested? You hate that trade, you avoid it like the plague, what made you change your mind?”

“Who said I changed my mind?” Defensive, too defensive and he knew it. If he didn’t calm down he would draw the attention of the barista, who would realise that the two of them were more than just students trying to get some late night studying done.

“Yuuri you’re my friend, and I will help you however I can, but I’m not going into whatever you’re planning blind. I’ve got to watch my back too.” Phichit always had been reasonable, even when they’d been students together trying to size each other up, and each work out if the other was in the family business. Phichit might like to act the playful airhead, but no-one survived this long actually being one.

“I need the money.” Yuuri admitted aloud for the first time. It was a concrete declaration of something he had only been thinking about it abstract terms for the longest time.

“No offense, but you own a multi-bedroom residence right in the centre of soho. All you need to do to get money is ask.”

“I don’t need pocket money, Phichit. I need more than my stipend, I need something substantial, something that’s mine that my uncle and father can’t track. I need…”

He cut himself off, but it was already too late.

“You need to escape,” Phichit voiced it, that little nagging thing that had been haunting Yuuri for months, years even. Such a small world really, so simple and yet… Yuuri gritted his teeth, to stop himself from biting his own tongue.

“What about Victor?” Phichit said finally, little more than a whisper.

Yuuri had heard of heart-stopping moments, but he didn’t think that they would actually feel like this, as though the split second of a single heartbeat would drag out for minutes at at time.

“I’m paid to notice things, Yuuri. Don’t worry, no one else has put it together yet, but it may only be a matter of time. You’ve got to think about what you can get away with here. There’s little point in selling to the highest bidder if it gets you killed in the process.

“Look…” Yuuri began, but he couldn’t put into words all he was thinking of, all that might be his plan for getting out of this life and leaving his heritage behind, it was much too scary to name.

“Don’t say anything, I want plausible deniability here. I understand what you’re trying to do here, I really do, but to try something like this seems desperate.”

“I feel desperate.”

The desperation was turning to something that was dangerously close to a plan. Victor might be home already, but Yuuri couldn’t go back there yet, he had one more thing he had to do tonight. 

~*~

“Yuuri!” Minami gasped and tried to sit up, before realising that even through a haze of morphine stab wounds were still incredibly painful. His skin was almost as pale as the sheets he lay on, and despite his toothy grin the grimace of pain showed in the lines around his eyes.

“Lay down,” Yuuri instructed, “What’s the point in sitting up if you pull out your stitches. I need you in one piece.”

“Yes boss.” Minami whimpered, laying flat as instructed, as though it were the most sacred of duties. “How are you feeling?”

“Why are you asking me that, I should be the one asking you how you’re doing. You’re lucky to be awake right now.”

“I got to sleep when they were operating, you had to be awake the entire time, I think you’re probably worse off than me.”

“Well thank you for your consideration,” Yuuri sat down next, “I think you should focus on your own well being for now though. You’re important to me.”

Minami’s bottom lip wobbled, and Yuuri was scared that the kid might start to cry, but instead he bit his lip, put on his soldier face. “I’ve already spoken to Oyabun-sama about what happened, but I want to tell you what I told him.”

“He came to speak to you himself?” Yuuri was taken aback, whilst Yuuri favoured him, Minami was little more than a punk, an underling. For the boss to come and see him meant that more people had heard about the significance of what had happened than they let on.

“He said that it was a courtesy to you, as you’d had to look after me.” Minami would accept that explanation, he was too innocent and obedient to question the Oyabun, but Yuuri knew better. He was a kind enough person, but couldn’t afford to waste his time on some little disposable newbie footsoldier.

“That’s… kind of him.” Yuuri picked out his words carefully, “What did he ask you?”

“Just if I knew who did it and where they came from, if I knew any reason for it. I didn’t know the guy personally, I sort of recognised him, but he could have been anyone, Russian probably. I swear, I would tell you anything, everything. I didn’t tell him”

“I know Minami,” Yuuri patted Minami harder on the shoulder than perhaps he should have, considering the stitches, but even through his flinch he was wide eyed and awed at the single touch. As he relaxed and settled back down, he leaned over to the monitor on his side, and clicked the button for pain relief a few times. More reason for Yuuri to feel like the scum of the earth.

He could pretend he was here for Minami. Part of him definitely was, but more of his was here for what Minami knew. Despite his earlier words, that Minami’s health was paramount, it didn’t stop him from seeking the answers he wanted.

“Guang-Hong was here,” Minami offered eventually, slurring ever so slightly, “He didn’t have much to tell me, just wanted to say hi, but he didn’t mention a couple of things, didn’t tell Oyabun-Sama, but I wanted to tell you.”

“Hmm, what’s that?” Yuuri feigned a gentle curiosity, when his entire being was screaming for answers.

Minami bit his lip with a pointed tooth, taking a few uncertain beats before speaking, “He said that it belonged to them, to the Triads. There was some guy involved who was supposed to look after the transportation, someone who was ‘on the books’, but it went awry. He didn’t want to tell me any details.”

“Not surprising,” Yuuri understood the need for discretion, even when you were trying to help a friend, it wasn’t worth your life. The information didn’t really pin anything down either, didn’t even really confirm whose books they were on, probably Triad as well, but who knew. Even ‘on the books’ could mean anything, it was mostly lawyers and accountants, but all sorts of people were technically ‘on the books’ without being directly involved.

“Sorry, I didn’t help.” Minami’s voice was tired, wobbly, barely above a whisper. Probably the morphine kicking in again.

“There’s nothing to be sorry for, it’s Triad business, nothing to do with us, I just wanted to make sure that you were going to be safe.”

Bright eyes were starting to drift closed, “But it’s the perfect way for you to get money and go and live somewhere you can have a puppy without it getting kidnapped. Then you won’t be sad...”

Shit, he hadn’t thought of Vicchan in such a long time. As he watched Minami start to fall asleep, he wondered, not for the first time, if the little kid knew more than he let on. He might hide behind bravado and playful swagger, but he saw a lot. There was no way that Yuuri would tell Oyabun that Minami withheld information from him, not when even the suspicion of knowing more than he should almost got him killed, but what he knew might be enough to ruin them all.

He put in head in his hands, and tried to remember how to breathe.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Kona (粉, literally flour or powder) is discreet Japanese slang to mean Heroin


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Yuri's first day of freedom is not idyllic or remotely free.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have been incredibly occupied with real life for the past few months. I know I’m terrible at updating, but I never intended to be away this long. I shall not make a promise as to when this gets updated again, just know that it will be updated and it will be finished. That’s as much as I can give you right now.
> 
> Everything has been strictly chronological up to now, but this is where all the different pov timelines will start overlapping, so just keep that in mind if it gets confusing. Also WARNING, there are going to quite explicit mentions of drug use, drug withdrawal and attempted sexual assault mentioned in this chapter.

It was the shaking that was the worst, sure the vomiting sucked, but at least once he threw up it was done for a while. But that feeling of deep seated cold, the feeling that nothing could get rid of; that was hell. Even in his bunk, wrapped in as many thin blankets as he could hoping against hope that even the mild early autumn months would keep him warm, but no heater was any good against a good old fashioned heroin drop. Nothing like going cold turkey to make a person appreciate electric blankets and radiators.

Even though he had been good to go according to the doctors, every inch of his skin was still covered in a cold sweat and even through the pain he could appreciate how horrific he must have looked and smelled. If he could take a break from the shaking - god fuck it, he wished he could stop the shaking - then he could go and get a shower. A boiling hot shower might kill two birds with one stone, that was if he could stand. He had been lacking the energy to do anything more than crawl into his bunk and lament being discharged from a place of relative safely. Even eating in the canteen took too much energy. 

In so much as he could feel grateful about any of this shit, he was glad that the guards were still bringing him his food for now; he didn’t want people to see his face unless they absolutely had to. He didn’t know much about prison life beyond horror stories, but he knew that the first impression made could stick with you for your entire sentence.

He wasn’t an idiot, despite what others might say. He knew  _ exactly _ how much trouble he could get into around this place. He didn’t want to add any fuel to that raging inferno waiting to happen. If he was going to get through his time here then his first impression needed to be immaculate.

The shivering persisted as he pulled of the layers that he had cocooned himself in. The only benefit he gained from leaving his bunk was that he had managed to do it silently enough to avoid unwanted attention.

The showers were warm enough to have been worth getting out of bed, but no matter how much he pulled pathetically at the tap, the temperature refused to climb any higher. Everything came back to stopping kids killing or maiming each other in this place. His hair spilled down his back, and he could feel the grime washing away. Getting clean was the closest to the real world he had felt in this god forsaken purgatory that was his life.

He shouldn’t have faced away from the door. He definitely shouldn't have closed his eyes or let the sound of the shower drown out the rest of the room, but as everyone always said, hindsight was twenty-twenty.

It wasn’t until one hand was wrapped in his hair, pulling his head back and another was firmly clamped around his mouth that he even realised his mistake. The most dangerous mistake that he had ever made, except for perhaps the one that had got him inside in the first place.

“Aren’t you the prettiest piece of arse I’ve seen in a long time.” A gritty voice crooned in his ear, “All soft and defenseless. Fresh meat just ready for the taking.”

Hard lines of a body, covered in rough cloth were pushing him up against a wall. Pelvis pushed against his backside to pin him as a knee knocked Yuri’s legs apart. The hand that had been in Yuri’s hair wrapped around his throat. The boy was whispering other things as Yuri struggled, things about protection and safety and making deals, but Yuri wasn’t listening. This was  _ not _ what was going to happen. He was terrified, definitely not strong enough to fight off someone of this size, but he wasn’t going to let this be the prisons’ first impression of him.

What kind of idiot showered without a shiv. Not Yuri that was for certain and his attacker hadn’t even noticed. He reached back and stabbed anything within reach, a thigh, groin, wrist. The water circling the drain ran red with blood as Yuri was finally able to turn around to face the piece of shit. Blind anger welled up inside him as he stabbed and stabbed and stabbed. Over and over even as the body lay limp and still but he couldn’t stop. 

~*~

Yuri woke suddenly, eyes flying open, sweating and panting. He was shaking again damn it. He hated the fucking shaking.

“Everything is fine,  _ Malysh _ . It’s just a dream.” Yuri could feel fingers carding through the mess of his hair, soothing him gently.

He could feel his grandfather trying to lay flat the scraggly and rough ends. He’d hacked them short with the very same shiv that had saved his life. He swore he could still feel blood on his hands as he buried his face in them, trying to get a grip on his currently reality. Dedushka said that it was just a dream, but it wasn’t just a dream. Could he ever tell anyone how close he had come to being… He couldn’t even think the word without needing to throw up. It was as far from a dream as he could get. It had been a nightmare, a living nightmare.

He hadn’t killed the guy though, hadn’t actually stabbed them, or had he? The threat and shock had been enough for him to grab his stuff and get away. Or had he actually hurt someone when he was inside? It was hard to remember that time in his life well. Between the fever dreams and the constant fear, everything was a sort of haze. He sat up on the small sofa and scrubbed at his face, before glancing around the old familiar living room. A half eaten piroshki sat on a plate on the table next to him. Cold now, which saddened him. His grandfather was looking at him with a mix of affection and concern.

“How long was I asleep?” Yuri questioned, the soft winter light still streamed through the window. He wasn’t normally able to sleep during the day, strange how a few months could change him.

“Maybe an hour, you were very tired. It’s important for you to sleep.”

He was so angry about wasting his time with his grandpa with something as useless as sleeping when he saw him so few hours in a week. Angry only at himself, when after months of being unable to see his grandpa, that he didn’t even get the chance to talk to him properly. A glance at the clock told him that it was already approaching noon. His first appointment with the counsellor was at 3 and he couldn’t risk missing it for fear of finding himself straight back in that hell of a prison. Why couldn’t they have given him a ‘checkout’ appointment when he was still on the inside.

Because most junkies will go straight for a hit as soon as they leave, that’s why. He knew that for the rest of his life that would be how he was labelled by the system. He couldn’t even blame them. He got defensive about it when talking to his father’s side of the family, they didn’t deserve any fucking honesty or explanation from him, but he wasn’t an idiot. He knew  _ exactly  _ what he had been doing to himself.

“You should have woken me up.” He lamented, but he wasn’t angry at his grandpa, he could never be angry at him. He was angry at himself. He was always so fucking angry at himself. Almost as angry as he was at that cunt Yakov. Almost.

“It’s almost lunchtime, Malysh. I’ve got some borscht left over, an I can heat up those piroshkis for you.”

“Won’t the shop be really busy right now?” Yuri questioned, “You always get a huge queue of students normally?”

“I’ve closed the shop for the day, it’s not every my favourite grandchild comes home.”

“Grandpa, you shouldn’t do that for me. You know how fickle business is around here.”

“Thank you for your concern, Yurochka, but business is never fickle when there are students involved. Who sells food better to deal with a hangover than a Russian? What’s one day? There will be plenty of other Mondays.”

There it was, the crux of the matter. Kolya may have done a good business, but his shop was small and the rent was expensive. He may have sold out of his goods on a daily basis, but he was one man and never made very much to begin with. He refused to raise his prices, refused to hire help, refused to industrialise his process. He lived on a successful but fragile business model.

And he would give up everything he had worked for, for decades, just for Yuri. Just to let Yuri nap in safety and comfort.

Yuri had always wanted to stay with Nikolai. He had  _ never _ had any interest in Yakov and his cronies, even his uncle who had been relatively kind to him, was nothing in comparison to the familial bonds he shared with his grandpa. Theirs was a bond forged of genuine love and mutual loss. But Kolya was just one man, Yakov had an entire army at his disposal.

The vague (and not so vague) threats that were made towards Nikolai and his business if he didn’t give up custody, were severe, enough to ruin him a hundred times over, and Nikolai hadn’t once accepted. Even as his rent creeped up, even as a rival shop opened up next door, even as rumours of failed food safety inspections swirled around, he refused to even consider the matter.

But Yuri could see through the smiles and the bravado. Kolya was an old man, he had already been older when Yuri’s mother was born, and now he was trying to look after a child as the world was trying to fall down around his ears. So Yuri made the decision for both of them, to submit himself to the mob, and all that entailed, in exchange for absolute protection of Nikolai.

He often wondered how much his grandpa knew of his deal. If he would have made a counteroffer, if he would have packed up everything without a penny to his name to take them both away to somewhere new, somewhere out of the reach of the mob. Yuri knew that he would have. He knew that all he had to do was ask, and they would be gone.

That’s why he never asked.

“Come, Yuri. Let’s not worry about such things. Lunch is important, sleep is important.”

Borscht was the best food for a cold day like this, second only to piroshki themselves, and Yuri  _ wanted _ to wrap himself up in that feeling, wrap himself up in the illusion that this could last for ever, even down to the last cooling dregs.

“Come now, if you’ve finished, I can sort your hair for you.”

The Yuri of six months ago might have protested this. Even now, despite it all, Nikolai would give him the very simple utilitarian haircuts of his childhood. Since he was about thirteen he had been heading to the local Toni&Guy to get a look that wouldn’t get him picked on in the playground.

But this wasn’t six months ago, this was now, and the thought of having his grandpa cut his hair brought him back to the gentle way Nikolai had combed and washed his hair before trimming it gently down that first time. The first time his hair had been in ruins when in his misplaced grief Yuri had taken a dull pair of scissors and hacked off his long locks.

_ “Your hair is just like your mother’s”.  _ Nikolai had said with a deep sadness in his eyes. Yuri used this to justify the action later, - He didn’t want his Grandpa to be sad, he didn’t want to remind people of his mother unnecessarily - but the truth was, he had just wanted to destroy something.

He had a long history of trying to destroy himself it seemed.

At least Yuri was better at stopping himself from crying these days. That was a lie. Yuri had tears welling in his eyes as soon as he say in front of the bathroom mirror and heard Nikolai’s gentle tutting. He hadn’t looked at himself much over the last couple of months, the mirrors in the prison were all made of polished metal for safety and they were all scratched to hell.

The tired eyes, mess of hair that looked more like straw than ever and the thinness of his face and body made for a terrible image. Yuri wasn’t vain, but it was hard to look at himself. That was also a lie. He was a dancer at heart, there was a certain amount of vanity that came with it, even if he hadn’t danced for a couple of years now.

That would change though, Victor had promised. Then again Victor had promised a lot of things, and each one didn’t come to much. He didn’t know why he held so much store in what Victor said, it wasn’t as if he even liked him. That was a lie too.

Little tiny snippets of hair dropped onto Yuri’s shoulders and lap. The scraggly and abused ends falling away to leave something that looked presentable, if not exactly what Yuri might have chosen for himself.

Nikolai could have been finished half an hour ago, but was spending time trimming a few millimeters of hair from here and there to no great effect, but to their mutual quiet comfort. Their little piece of silence was interrupted by a sharp rap at the door. Yuri closed his eyes and let go of one shaking breath. He knew exactly who it would be.

“We can pretend that we didn’t hear it, Yurochka.” Grandpa murmured the closest he would ever come to admitting that He held no respect or regard for Yakov and his people.

“I’ll be just fine, Grandpa.” Lies seemed to be his speciality today “I’ll see you soon okay. I’ll make sure that I come around again this week.”

“Alright then, let’s just get you cleaned up.” He took the towel off Yuri’s shoulders, carefully brushing away any of the stray hairs that had fallen in the process.

Yuri sat on the stairs, stubbornly refusing to greet whoever it was at the door until he absolutely had to, but Nikolai pottered over to the door anyway. Nothing Yuri did would ever stop the moment that was coming.

“Ah, Georgi.” his grandfather’s voice echoed down the hallway, any warmth was feigned, but Georgi wouldn’t care. It wasn’t his job to care about what Nikolai thought of him.

“Is Yuri still here?” he questioned politely as he could. Everyone treated Kolya as politely as they would treat their own grandfather (and for many of the syndicate, far more politely than they would ever treat their blood relatives), and Nikolai took this with as much grace as he was able.

The silence echoed for long enough for Yuri’s presence to be undeniable. He didn’t have to be able to see the two of them to know that his grandpa was silently contemplating if he could ever get away with hiding Yuri away, and yet knowing that there was nothing he could do to prevent their separation. The silence was followed by a heavy sigh.

“I’ll go and speak to him. You wait out here.” He gently prevented Georgi from stepping across the threshold. Yuri was grateful that this space would always remain theirs. His one tiny corner of fantasy in a bitter reality.

Yuri stared at his feet as Nikolai’s own footsteps drew closer. The dread was starting to overwhelm him. Nikolai wrapped him up tight in his arms, the few seconds they had left together would be over soon enough. “I love you very much,  _ Malysh _ . Always.”

“Love you too, Grandpa.”

It hurt. It always hurt so fucking bad, but he wouldn’t let the bastard see him cry.

~*~

“Anyway, I hope that now you’re back, you’ll start taking your position at little bit more seriously. You owe me and this establishment that much. Don’t forget that  _ you  _ were the one who agreed to your position as heir apparent to this company...”

Yakov had spent the last half an hour going over the same empty rhetoric and harsh put downs. Yuri was surprised that the old bastard hadn’t run out of breath, he was red enough in the face for it.

“...Can’t be doing with a trumped up junkie slut in the business, and you were well on your way to becoming one. You mark my words Yuri, there’s nothing more I would like that to put you right back in that place until you hit eighteen, then maybe you’ll really learn what it’s like to suffer hardship. You were being a spoiled brat for no reason, when you’ve had nothing but the best education and the best resources. It’s a pathetic grab for attention that’s more in line with some pathetic bored sorority bitch than someone who’s supposed to be undertaking a major business in the future and…”

On and on and on it went, Yakov poking and tearing at all the vulnerable places that Yuri never wanted people to see. Yuri had always deep down wanted three main things in life, to be taken seriously, to be successful and to get as far away from Yakov as possible. His  _ grandfather _ knew just how to point out how pathetic and dependant he was at every available opportunity.

The only defense was to block it out  and smirk. It wasn’t like Yakov would be asking for his opinion any time soon, it really didn’t matter if he was listening or not. The barrage of words couldn’t be allowed to sink in. If they did then Yakov would win, and there was almost nothing more that Yuri hated than to lose.

“Anyway, all I wanted to say was to welcome you home, and let you know that Georgi is going to be accompanying you from now on. You will be homeschooled by Ms Lilia until you can be trusted to return to normal schooling, and Georgi will escort you to and all appointments.”

Georgi was always the best bet for Yuri’s appointments, he didn’t have any tattoos where they couldn’t be covered up. Most others had at least small ones on their hands and neck, not so good to remain anonymous when he was to see the authorities and social services as the terms of his release. More than that, he was Yakov’s lap dog. Georgi wouldn’t be disobeying his master’s orders for the sake of Yuri, or at least that was Yakov was led to believe.

In the back of his mind he thought that Georgi might have a fatherly soft spot for him, he hoped that it was the case anyway, it would guarantee his silence when it came to his private lessons with Lilia.

Yuri didn’t say anything, there was no way that Yakov would give him a chance to anyway. What was the point in trying when it came to that bastard? Even though it hadn’t been said in as many words, he knew full well when he was being dismissed. He glanced at Georgi as he walked passed. In the past Georgi had least pretended to give him a semblance of privacy. He had clearly lost that right now, as he stepped in line behind him. Even his brooding silence was a heavy presence over his shoulder.

“Georgi,” he called without looking over his shoulder, “I’m going to find out who it was who got me sent inside. Make whatever reports you want about where I go, but if you breathe a word of this to Yakov I will end you. The old bastard won’t live forever and when I’m in charge I won’t forget.”

Georgi said nothing.

~*~   
  


“What are you looking at arsehole?”

Otabek Altin’s face was as unflinchingly blank as always, he always looked to be half confused, half bored by whatever proceedings were occurring. It made it hard for Yuri to get a read on him. He had seen the man around the prison, and he had seen him once or twice before he was released with the hope that the two could get to know each other before the arduous responsibilities of weekly meetings for an entire year.

The other probation officers he had as his case went to trial tried to be ‘hip’ and ‘fun’, to try and gain his trust, but the kind of kid that got himself into prison wasn’t likely to be swayed by some hippy wearing an ironic t-shirt it was just fact.

In their meetings Otabek didn’t really speak. He prefered to let Yuri do the talking, cracking him into throwing out words just to break the oppressive silence. Yuri was more pissed than anything that it worked, but he had a grudging respect for the guy. He supposed that as a probation officer there were far worse things that the man could be than impassively blank.

Blank was far better than the cloying pity with which the prison counselor had looked at him. And despite the blankness of that look, there was a hint of something under there, a genuine smile or a sarcastic smirk, that made him glad that Otabek was the one in charge of his case.

“Otabek will do, or Mr Altin if you prefer formality.” but he stubbornly refused to answer Yuri’s question. If Yakov could see, then he would take it as another opportunity to goad Yuri. It was a prime example of how he wasn’t fit to be in charge of his own life and his own decisions. What mobster thought that an officer was a good guy without attempting to either bribe or murder them? He grinned to himself at the thought. Yes he was going to be good friends with Otabek Altin, the more people who would be pissed off because of it the better.

Otabek was silent and he strapped Yuri’s arm to the table and swabbed at the inside of his pale track marked elbow with a alcohol wipe.

Yuri didn’t even flinch at the needle going into his arm to withdraw the required vial of blood. For the briefest of moments  _ Mr Altin _ looked apologetic, saddened at causing another pain even in his line of work. Yuri cocked a half smile of appreciation at his concern, it was genuine not some sympathetic mask he felt he had to put on like the counsellor did. “I’m used to needles  _ Beka _ , kind of why I’m here in the first place.” Beka was not one of the name options he was given, all the more reason to use it.

It was funny though, in a detached sort of way, to watch the blood flow out into the syringe, rather than to be pushing something back inside. There had been nothing better at the time than the moment of sliding the needle into his arm. The anticipation of the hit just as good, if not better than the hit itself. Once the smack took hold he was in too much of a haze to appreciate it, but that moment before that hit, whilst he was still aware enough to know it was about to happen. That was nirvana right there.

Fucking stupid in retrospect. He hadn’t even liked getting high, hadn’t liked getting out of control. He had just wanted to give himself over to something that was his own choice. It was his own choice to get stoned out of his mind, it was his own choice to throw himself into that oblivion and do stupid things in his inhibition and possibly die. It wasn’t a good decision, or a smart decision, but at least it was  _ his. _

“I’ll phone you with the details of that tomorrow. Now you did well in your BTec when in prison. There are several colleges in the area that we have links with. However you wish to continue your education we can help facilitate that, but it is one of the most important terms of your probation.”

“Don’t worry your pretty head over that. I’ve got a private tutor; it’s already been approved.”

Otabek looked through his papers for several silent minutes, the furrow between his eyebrows deepening as he looked down at each different paper.

“I hadn’t heard anything about that. There’s nothing in my paper work that suggests…”

Yuri resisted - though only just barely- placing his feet on Otabek’s precious paperwork in order to lean back with a smug grin. Watching the composed Otabek fall into silent disbelief was strangely enjoyable to watch. Seeing someone lose their faith in the system always made Yuri feel like less on an isolated freak.

“Phone the office, I’m sure they’ll confirm it for you.”

Otabek fixed him with a considering stare, not so much aggressive as concerned and fearful. He walked to the corner of the room where a single emergency mobile was present. He never quite took his eyes of Yuri as he phoned the number only turning sharply towards the corner of the room when the call was answered.

“Hello sir, Otabek Altin speaking. I have here a Yuri Plisetsky. Yes sir, I was assessing his education needs and he claims he’s already been approved through for a private tutor. Really? But none of the social services approved tutors have had any free slots available. Yes, but it’s always in the best interest of the child to… Well isn't it my job to ask questions. I don’t think… No… Look I see that but... No, no I understand. Goodbye sir.”

Watching the man’s face fall from a look of indignant aggravation to genuine worry was exactly what Yuri had hoped for. He knew more than enough the people who were in his grandfather’s pocket, and the channels through which Lilia’s tutoring had been approved. Otabek knew that he’d just fallen into something far more serious than he had originally been prepared for, but whether he knew exactly what had happened would remain to be seen. Either way, because his superior had asked it of him, he would remain silent.

He needed Otabek to understand exactly who he was dealing with and what connections Yuri had at his disposal (or at least could pretend to have). Otabek would almost certainly not be swayed by threats, bribes or anything that would compromise that pure moral compass, but if he understood that the support system he prided himself in being a part of was less absolute than he thought it was, he might be just the sort of opening that Yuri needed. He wanted to make a friend of the man, but he could be worth so much more than that.

There were people Yuri needed to bring to justice, and he would use every channel at his disposal until he could get the son of a whore. Yuri could tell Otabek everything he needed to know in order to name the crooked cops in the city and in return Yuri could get a handle on whichever bastard it was who had wanted him out of the way in the first place. There were lists upon lists who might have used Yuri to get an opening into certain lucrative trades. It would be up to him to find the one who had the gall enough to cross him.

No-one else cared enough to help him. He would just have to learn how to help himself.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The parts of Victor's world refuse to stay separate.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Trigger warning: torture, mentions of underage drug abuse.

The room was dark, except for the bright lights shone in the face of the man tied to the chair. His face was unmarked and would remain so, Victor didn’t want to risk that the man would become unconscious or have his speech impaired, not a single word could be missed. The rest Victor couldn’t care less about. The bastard had spat on his favourite coat. He would have to get it dry cleaned or possibly burned.

Victor only knew the man by his vague familial connections to The Firm. If he was any closer to them Victor might have been more careful, it was best not to call down their wrath if one could help it, but he was pretty certain they would be safe from that. This little bitch was nothing more than a unremarkable stain on society.

“What’s this, then? Father dearest finally send one of his pet thugs after me. Well tell him I’m not interested.” 

The posturing didn’t exactly impress Victor, the details of the file flashed in his mind’s eye. This  _ kid _ was estranged from his father at best, and more likely completely disowned. Even then, the father wasn’t a member of the firm, just turned a blind eye to the gambling fixes down at his race track.

“Such arrogance to think that any of this is to do with you.”

“Sorry, I don’t make deals with rent boys so go take back whatever money he gave you and give him a lap dance instead. It would make him just as happy I’m sure.”

Victor’s enforcer, Andrei, backhanded the boy across the face for his disrespect, in one sharp, and loud motion, that left him spitting blood on the floor, so much for leaving his face unmarked. Normally Victor would allow Andrei to do whatever he liked, but this boy was the kind of coward who would cave quickly. Victor wanted him cognisant enough to answer his questions. He raised his hand in a casual halting motion.

“Pathetic little boy, so angry at the world because Daddy wouldn’t buy you the right coloured lamborghini for your birthday. The kind of whelp who falsely believes that someone might give a fuck about him. Let’s be clear, the only reason you are here is to answer my questions. If it weren’t for the terrible insolence you showed me and my colleague this afternoon, I wouldn’t have even gone to the trouble of bringing you here. But you have information I want, or I would have had you killed then and there as I would anyone else in the face of such rudeness.”

“I don’t know anything, so just fuck off.”

Victor tuted mockingly, “So little respect this one.” he commented to Andrei, “He does not even ask with which title he should address me. And such lies. I haven’t seen such insolence in many, many years. The boy doesn’t even have the manners to know he should only speak when spoken to.”

“Perhaps an etiquette lesson is necessary?” Andrei suggested. Victor hadn’t  _ originally _ intended to do the boy any harm at all, but Victor was in the place to teach him one of the most valuable lessons available to a person in his position. Don’t fuck with people bigger, smarter and more powerful than you.

Victor gave a small gesture of permission with an open hand, “You’re a far better educator than I am. Make sure that he can talk though. Perhaps his memory will be jogged, then he can answer a few of my questions.”

“Do you think he’s right-handed or left-handed, Vor?” Andrei asked Victor, opening his box of tricks.

“I would normally just ask but as this young man is so insistent that he is entirely unable to answer my questions, then I’m afraid we’ll just have to hazard a guess.”

“Statistically more likely to be right-handed, I suppose?”

“You were always better at mathematics than me, If that is what the statistics say then it must be so.”

Andrei delicately slid his hand underneath the boy’s palm. So softly and gently that it wouldn’t have seemed out of place for him to lift it to his lips for a kiss. Except for the physical impossibility, considering that the boy was bound to the chair by the wrist. He instead placed a monkey wrench around the tip of the index finger and tightened it to what had to have been a crushing level. The boy grit his teeth at that, but when Andrei threw the wrench down, dislocating the finger from the socket, the scream was absolute.

“I think our guest here gets the impression.” Victor allowed, perhaps more gracefully than he felt. Now, are you ready to answer my question?”

“What?” The boy snapped, gritting his teeth once more, but all Andrei had to do was flick the wrench that was hanging from the now ruined finger, and a fresh wave of pain contorted those features.

“Yes.” he whimpered, barely more than a breath.

Victor nodded, and Andrei undid the wrench and stepped back. “What do you know of the circumstances involving the arrest of Yuri Plisetsky?”

It was clear from the change in the boy’s face that whatever answer he gave it wouldn’t be one Victor was happy with. Andrei grinned, yet another chance to cause pain, he had already begun to approach. Victor was quietly put off by the enthusiasm. Andrei was one creepy bastard.

“I don’t have anything to do with that stupid slut, so you can just fuck off.”

Victor’s shoulders stiffened. 

“Slut? Interesting use of language there. The sort of word you might want to be careful about, because if I find you’ve laid a single lecherous finger on my  _ underage _ nephew. You will soon understand how your gelding horses feel.”

Andrei was now rummaging through his box again, pulling out a surgical roll, and unwrapping it to reveal a collection of beautifully kept scalpels. The boy squirmed in place, desperately trying to close his legs from where they too were tied open and shaking his head rapidly.

“Oh god,” He begged, “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it. I didn’t do anything I promise. I swear we weren’t like that.”

“Hmm, we’ll see about that. Andrei is very good at detecting liars, aren’t you, my dear? You wouldn’t mind if he just looks a little closer. Sees if he can find the truth in your eyes?”

Victor closed his eyes as Andrei approached, the panicked whimpers that persisted were hard to block out, but they would become background noise soon enough.

~*~

Victor had come to complete his standard report when Mila found him, she seemed anxious, and there was only one person that Victor knew who brought out that emotion in her. Yakov wouldn’t seem any different on the surface, at least not in front of Victor, but Victor could tell from the people around him whether Yakov could have been said to have a good day or a bad day. How they acted told Victor himself how he would have to act.

No informal father-son conversations were going to happen today then, Yakov would be wanting only the utmost respect. When Yakov had so little respect for his own family, being treated like a family member would just annoy him more than ever. No, today he was simply the boss, the head honcho, and Victor would shut up and listen.

“Take a seat Vitya” Yakov gestured to the chair on the other side of his desk. “How were the rounds this evening? Everything run smoothly?” He didn’t even look up from whatever had engrossed him on the papers on his desk, numbers ran together. They weren’t Victor’s speciality, but he would have to learn. He was going to be in charge, no matter what he really wanted out of his life. This would be his world, his empire, whatever that contained.

“I’ve not started my rounds yet, however I completed…”

“You can give me a report later, that’s not what I’m really interested in.” Yakov cut across him, he didn’t need to listen to anyone, let alone someone as unimportant as Victor. To Yakov, Victor was a certainty, so he didn't need to appease him. Victor was there to do as he was told “There are a few little messes I’d like you to sort out for me.”

What was new? Victor was forever being the champion of the syndicate, putting forward the perfect front whilst Yakov barked instructions at him from the sidelines.He was practically a cleaner, just give him a mop and a vacuum and call it done. He hadn’t been happy when earlier that day Yuri had called him a lapdog, but he couldn’t pretend that there wasn’t some truth to that. 

He might do what he was asked, but that didn’t mean that he was stupid. That didn’t mean that he wasn’t ready to do whatever he needed to do to keep his friends, his family and his people safe.

“The main problem I want you to sort out is the problem of our little Yura,” Yakov was even less entitled to use the affectionate diminutive than Victor was, but that wouldn’t stop him. Yuri, bitter and angry as he was with Yakov, still wouldn’t dare to tell him to fuck off to his face, not so soon after getting out of prison at least.

He was insulted that Yakov thought that he had to ask in order to get Victor to find out what had happened to Yuri. It wasn’t as though he hadn’t been looking himself, he had an idea of what might have happened, and he suspected some dirty dealing from some of the internal members of the Bratva, or at least some of the fringe members.

He wouldn’t show his offense to Yakov’s face though, that sort of disgust and disobedience was Yuri’s job. He was just going to do as he was told and make sure that whoever had hurt his nephew would get what was coming to them. He would make sure of it, whether Yakov had asked him to or not.

“Now obviously, our biggest problem isn’t Yuri himself, he doesn’t matter so much, but the fact that he managed to get arrested within our boundaries shows that there is at least someone, or more likely some people under our role that are not, living within the guidelines.”

And there was the biggest reason why Yuri hated Yakov. It was all well and good for Victor to look after Yuri as best he could, and to insist that Yakov  _ did _ love Yuri, but when he saw Yuri as nothing more than a pawn, a potential heir if something went wrong with Victor and a barometer for some of the other problems going down in the syndicate, then it was hard to try and glean any affection from the man that meant anything.

He was Vor, Krestniy Otets that was his job, that was what he would do. He had build their syndicate from the ground up when he had travelled from Moscow to London. For him that was all that mattered, the syndicate, the rules, the business, the game. Sometimes he felt as though Yakov had only got married and had children because he needed someone to carry on his business. There was a part of Victor that knew he was the way he was because Yakov had made him that way. Yakov could only be ready to retire, to give up his position as the head of the company if he could raise someone to perfectly fulfill that role. That was Victor’s position in life. The perfect placeholder once Yakov died.

He’d done his job, he had done it well, but Yakov wouldn’t see it like that. Yakov would only see the problems. Right now Yuri was the problem. Yuri’s life and lack of respect for his position in the company was Yakov’s biggest problem. Victor’s job was to fix that problem. Forget that they were both people, forget that they were humans with their own initiative and ideas and lives. They were, to Yakov, no more than objects to move around and manipulate.

Victor hated himself for knowing that he would simply do as he was told anyway.

“I need you to go and find as much information as you can, if there is a leak or a weak point in the chain, you need to eliminate it. Make sure that we’re watertight, do you understand?”

“Of course,” Victor said, forgoing the formal address that he would give the boss normally only because he would be unable to choke down the bitterness he felt if he made himself say the words.

“Report back tomorrow. No matter what your progress is, I need to get a better handle on where we go from here. And don’t let anyone know what you’re doing obviously. If you let it slip that there might be a rat in our kitchen then The Firm would see it as the perfect excuse to mount a hostile takeover. I didn’t work this hard all these years to let these British brats think they can run this place. As a side note, I’m sure you’ve heard this rumour of the case of good’s that have gone missing. If you happen to find out anything about it along your travels, let me know.”

“When do you want me to bring Yuri to you?” He asked, knowing he had promised to return to Yuri, even if in not so many words. He needed to, especially after everything, make sure that he kept his promises to Yuri. The boy was fragile enough as it was - even if he pretended that he wasn’t - and he wouldn’t take the perceived rejection of his uncle very well at all. Victor knew that he had ‘forgotten’ promises before tried to make a joke out of it so that Yuri wouldn’t expect too much and get too hurt, but the truth was he knew it would hurt Yuri no matter what he did, and he had never forgotten a promise he had made and broken. He regretted them all, with a few drunken exceptions, each promise broken had not been his choice, and if he had the choice he wouldn’t do it again. Especially now

One look at Yakov’s face and he knew he  _ didn’t _ have a choice though. Who was he kidding? Victor rarely if ever had a choice. Choices were for other people. Other people who weren’t built to suffer like the two of them were.

“He’s not of any importance right now.” Yakov dismissed, “I’ll make sure to bring him home myself. I need to speak to him.”

Speak to him would mean yelling at him, demeaning him and undermining him until Yakov had established again who was in charge, and in turn he had shown himself to be the biggest arsehole the world had ever seen. And by bringing him home himself, Yakov meant that he would send Georgi to try and intimidate Nikolai and steal Yuri away from him before he had had the chance to heal.

And Victor could do nothing about it. So he stayed silent, and still and hated himself.

~*~

Maybe it was this that made it so very easy to hurt  the man in front of him - or at least let Andrei hurt the man. It was as close as he could get to hurting the people and punishing the people that he wanted to hurt: the man who had got Yuri addicted, Yakov who had neglected and abused them all his whole life, and Victor himself, who was too chicken shit cowardly to do anything but follow instructions to the letter and had let those around him get hurt.

Victor didn’t like listening to Andrei’s particular methods. They were loud and unpleasant, even if not particularly bloody, and the sounds were a little too graphic for Victor’s overactive imagination. He had always been particularly creative, and his mind could fill in the blanks in ways that probably weren’t healthy.

He couldn’t block his ears, for fear of seeming weak, or put in headphones in to pretend to be nonchalant, for fear that he might miss something important, people would only be able to tell the truth, or at least anything they could say in order to get out of their situation, when they were in the active process. For hardened criminals getting information through these… particular channels, was not particularly useful. If someone was truly that hardened it was difficult to work out if what they were saying was the truth, or if they had simply blurted out anything in order to make the pain stop. And by the time you had checked that avenue, you might have any number of people on your tail. The only other option was to kill the guy in order to ensure his continued silence. Either way it was not ideal.

That didn’t meant that he was particularly pleased to be listening to it though. In fact it was quite the opposite. He wanted to be far away from here, as far away as possible. He had wanted to let his mind drift to thoughts of Yuuri, hopefully still in their bed and feeling better after his bath. He had looked so warm and curled up there in the sheets that Victor hadn’t the heart to wake him…

Then another scream broke through his haze of thoughts and he had to stop thinking of Yuuri. It was hard enough for the two of them to keep their professional lives and personal lives separate. He didn’t want to use the thought of Yuuri as a coping mechanism. There would be nothing worse than such a burden on his lover, and he didn’t want to associate their tender and loving moments with unbelievable violence and pain. Especially pain and violence that he himself had perpetrated. So instead he focused on nothing. He became nothing and no-one. He became the embodiment of his role in life. He became Vor. He became everything he hated, and that would get him through this.

“Please.” A voice whimpered, too much in pain to even scream. Victor held up his hand to indicate that Andrei could stop. The man looked almost disappointed by this action. Victor had to wonder again why the fuck they kept a man like this on their roll. Expect, of course, that he was very good at what he did and very creative with it.

“Anything to say now?” Victor asked, sugary sweet, far more disconcerting and worrying than any anger or violence could ever be. This man - this kid - would be unable to read him or the situation. Was Victor bored, was he frustrated, was he ready to give up? With a simple soft smile and an even simpler question he made sure that the boy would never know.

“There was this pig.” he whimpered, Victor assumed the boy didn’t mean the little druggie buddies had been hanging out at farms on the weekends. “We had our own dealers, pushers, whatever. Reputable sources, clean stuff that wouldn’t get us hurt.”

“For a certain definition of not hurt.” Victor scoffed, “Heroin addiction isn’t a walk in the park,” 

“But one day our normal suppliers were starting to go missing.” 

This was concerning, the whole point of having the police on their books was so that the drug dealers had reliable channels to work through and the syndicates had a reliable source of income. There was no point in having police run interference if members still got arrested on a regular basis. One or two was normal, there would always be good guys, honest people who genuinely put as much effort into cleaning up the streets as they could manage, but for the most part the areas that were mob controlled stayed that way. That’s why they fought so hard over post codes. They worked and survived within a limited area. If they stepped outside that area then the full weight of the metropolitan police force would be upon them, but that was  _ why _ they were supposed to be safe within their own boundaries. Police didn’t want to be involved in gang disputes any more than the gangs wanted police involvement.

“How many?” Victor ventured to ask, trying to keep as calm and collected as he was before, but there was a lot of shaking in his voice, he knew all too well.

“I don’t know,” he winced away from Andrei as he said the words, knowing that they had got him into trouble before “I wasn’t too heavily involved, but some of the people in the group, those who were small time dealers themselves, they estimated that maybe eight to ten people had been arrested within a span of a couple of weeks. And that was just direct from our area.”

This boy either knew more than he let on about the system or was just a confused kid who wondered where his party suppliers had gone, but either way, Victor knew that this was exactly what had started everything. One or two was normal. Three or four was a coincidence, but that many. That was a concerted effort, and frankly Victor was surprised that Yakov didn’t notice. That was even more disconcerting than before. Something really had to be a problem if they hadn’t noticed.

“Then this guy came up to us. The policeman, but he only threatened to arrest us. He had with him a fuckton of papers and stuff to make us think that he could take us all to court right that second. Then he all of a sudden changed his tune, and said that he could make sure that we were all safe if we only bought through him. That’s all I know. I got out of it then, I couldn’t risk it on my record, but other people stuck around. Yuri was there, I know what he was like, he would probably have tried fighting the guy, especially if he had shot up any time recently. Which was likely, the only thing we really did together was shoot up.”

Victor had seen the track marks, he had seen the way that Yuri had suffered when in the YOI, but it still hurt him to think of his precious little nephew, still just a child, as doing anything so dangerous to himself. God, how easy would it have been for Yuri to be assaulted, or killed, or worse when under the influence, or when trying to get back under the influence.

He had to let it go though, what was done was done and what was important in that moment was getting as much information as he could whilst their dear guest was loquacious and compliant.

“Any idea of what he looked like? Did he say anything else.”

“I don’t…” The boy started again, then stopped quickly. “He was in police uniform.” he ventured.

“And the sky is blue and it sometimes rains in London, let’s see if we can remember something useful. Anything at all, his voice, his face, his hair. Anything.”

“His voice I remember. It was off, like he was raised in London, and had the whole London accent, maybe from the Bow area, but it was really weird, almost like he was American or something.”

That was good, that would narrow it down, or at least he could ask around. The syndicate didn’t tend to ask a lot of questions about the people they put on the books, personal history such as where they were born and where they had been raised didn’t tend to factor into whether someone was willing to take money to look the other way. They couldn’t exactly apply for a police background check from a drug-dealing police officer.

“His hair seemed normal, under cut or something, but like every other guy in london. Brownish I’d guess.” That was a shame, it really didn’t cut anything down, then again after several months had passed, who was there to say that this man couldn’t have completely changed his hairstyle. What was important was that it was a male, of an age to really focus on what was fashionable.

“Anything else that he said that you could remember?”

“I guess…” He hesitated, wincing as he tried to sit up a little straighter. “I guess he said that we shouldn’t be worried about contamination, because he was coming into a big haul of the good stuff or something. It didn’t make much sense, and I was pretty fucked up at the time.”

Victor hummed, assessing the boy in front of him. Now that the immediate threat to him had stopped, so had his complacency, he was starting to get that spark of arrogance back in his eyes. He would forever spend his life thinking that he was better than people. No matter how pathetic and ruined he was by drugs or torture or whatever else happened to him, he would always think he was above it all. Victor wanted to knock him down a few pegs.

How fucking dare he do something like that to his nephew. How dare he leave him to the dogs? How dare he not be as hurt by the situation as Yuri had been? What had this brat done to deserve being saved so spectacularly by circumstance? Nothing, that was what. And he didn’t even have the courtesy to realise how lucky he was.

“Well you know what they say. Sometimes it’s easiest to remember things when you’re in the same altered state as when the original incident happened. Maybe if you were a little fucked up again then you might remember more of what was said or what happened.” He turned to Andrei, who suddenly looked as excited as a gun dog after a pheasant, “Andrei, perhaps you could help fuck our dear friend here up a little, just check if he remembers anything.”

“Absolutely boss…”

~*~

When Victor went to that place, when he went so far into his role that he let things like this happen for no real good reason, it could be hard to bring himself back from that. He had made sure that Andrei cleaned up his own messes and then carefully packed the boy up and sent him to the nearest hospital in a black cab. Maybe it was okay letting Andrei go that far, knowing that the boy would probably be fine in the end, if a little traumatised. If anything it would serve the stupid bastard well, make sure that he was likely to stay out of trouble in the future. Especially gang and drug related trouble. Victor especially hoped that he would remain out of ‘remarking even casually about sexually abusing his young nephew’ type of trouble. If Victor had convinced him to stay away from that kind of trouble then he had done a good job.

Except that he knew he was just trying to excuse himself. He had gone to that place, as he did when he was working as Vor, and he had done it for petty revenge. He had done it because he had wanted someone  _ anyone _ to hurt for what had happened. He had let that monster free. That monster simply known as Victor Nikiforov. 

No wonder Yuri had said he hated Victor Nikiforov,  _ Victor _ hated Victor Nikiforov. And he knew that all of them in this business had that place within them. The monster waiting for an excuse to be set free. That didn’t mean that Victor knew how to cope with himself when it happened.

It didn’t matter, he didn’t have the luxury of caring about what had happened even five minutes previously. He had his job to do. He had found the information the needed to find, and now he had to continue on his normal rounds. As Yakov had instructed, he couldn’t let people know that he was investigating a potential leak or weakness in the syndicate. If that was the case then he couldn’t let people see he had disappeared from the scene. So it was simple enough he would continue the rounds, and in the spare moments that he had free he would continue his search for this mystery policeman.

The rounds were simple most days, he would pick up cheques and he would make sure his face was seen. He would ensure that there were no fights or altercations that he needed to break up and make sure that everyone and everything was in it’s space. It was a sense of control and place that he needed to keep more than anything. Funny how that was true about his own life as well.

He was later than he normally was, but it wasn’t too unusual. He was generally good at being seen at the same time in the same day. His reliability is what aided the reliability of syndicate. If they were oficial then they would be more likely to be respected and used, rather than other more ‘legitimate’ types of justice and protection.

Maybe he should have seen it coming, maybe Chris simply thought that this was the best time to be seen, maybe he had known that the manager normally checked everything and did his rounds before Victor turned up and so had expected the office to be abandoned and clear of everything and so his interference wouldn’t have been noticed ‘til morning…

Chris hadn’t worked at this club for a couple of weeks, and Victor had suspected in the back of his mind as to what that might mean, but he had hoped that he was wrong. Or perhaps he had just ignored his instincts on the matter, because in the end what was important was the continued belief that Victor and the syndicate had everything under control.

And there was Chris, dressed so casually that no-one would have questioned his presence in the club, especially since he had professed to enjoying it so much here, but simply moving onto the next big club that had offered him a large bonus for joining to them, but people suspected he would be back to this place. He was involved in every aspect of it, and Victor now understood why.

(He had always understood why, he had just been lying to himself)

Chris had frozen where he was when the door had been opened too fast for him to react, the lights had been off, but of course Victor could see by the light of Chris’s phone screen. He had always treated his phone and his photos as the most precious thing in the world, Victor had assumed that he was just a bit of an instagram whore, but now he could see that it was, in fact, his very life that would be on the line if that phone got into the wrong hands. It was everything that the police needed to shut down this entire operation in one convenient file. Even if the owners had burned all the paperwork to try and cover up their trails, Chris would have it all.

Chris sighed deeply, and though Victor couldn’t fully see his face, he imagined that it was something of a smile forming. If Victor was in the same position, with so many unknowns facing him in that moment he might have cried, or screamed, or ran. But Chris was so calm, and so resigned. Perhaps Victor could have closed the door. This wasn’t  _ really _ his club, it was just one that they kept an eye on with some very small compensation to sort out any roughians, nothing more than a few bratva acting as bouncers. It wasn’t his business what the owners and the strippers got up to once they left work, if they did favours on the side, that was definitely well outside the range of Victor’s business model.

But if he left, what would happen? Would Chris be content to have a life for a life? An unspoken debt repaid, if Victor let him go, then would he equally withhold any evidence he had on Victor as well? He doubted he had much on Victor, but even the smallest hint could allow others to push him out of the syndicate for fear that he might be a security risk.

“Do I want to know what you’re taking photos of in the middle of a darkened office whilst the owner is busy with running the club and therefore would definitely be nowhere to be seen for at least an hour?” Victor voiced, his normal tactic of removing anything but sweet humour from his voice was probably not the best idea now, but he had no idea how to respond to what was happening except polite sarcasm.

“Statistically speaking?” Chris asked, still not looking up to meet his eyes, but matching Victor’s light tone still, “Probably not. This was never your sort of thing.”

“No,” He sighed, “No I suppose it wasn’t, I had other things to deal with.”

“Yup.” The silence washed over them, and Victor didn’t even want to close the door for fear that the noise might attract too much attention. What would he do if the owner came in now. Would he lie and cover up for Chris? Maybe he could say that Chris was helping Victor locate his latest fee, but then why would the files be out of place on the employees extra-curricular activities. Maybe he would just throw Chris under the bus. The distant sound of sirens started to fill the street behind them, they wouldn’t be upon the club just yet, but he could see from Chris’s face that they would be. Fuck neither of them could be caught there.

“Perhaps you could politely put that back for me and then we could go somewhere else to get a drink. Somewhere a little quieter.”

He could practically see the cogs whirring in Chris’s head, on the one hand he wasn’t doing his job properly if he didn’t gather the evidence he needed to collect before the raid hit. But on the other hand he knew from where he was sitting that he would be dead if he didn’t get out of there soon; not now that Victor knew and could hold his life as leverage until Chris could ensure that both of them got out of the building safety. Hadn’t he said it himself? There were always the good guys, the ones who really believed that they could fix the world. He had liked Chris for a reason, he had trusted Chris for a reason even when he suspected that he was not all that he said he was. And Chris would try to get out of this in a way that would ensure that they were both safe. If he could think of it, which right now he couldn’t.

“Come on Chris, let’s go for a drink.”

“Alright then,” He sighed, putting the folder back on the shelf after snapping one last picture, and blasting Victor with a megawatt smile. “I really fancy a gin martini.”

The sirens grew closer and closer as the felt their way out of the building, the world behind them fading into nothing. Even as Victor knew he would soon hear the screams and distress of the club evacuating and the patrons and staff alike being arrested in droves. Victor knew it would be a stain on the syndicate, but he also knew that people were aware that this wasn’t their club, that the owners hadn’t opted to pay Victor and Yakov to get the police to look the other way, trusting that they could take care of their own business. Perhaps then, after all the noise had died down people would talk more about how they should have gone to Vor and asked for help. That it was in everyone’s best interest to ask for protection, how the syndicate clubs never got taken down.

It might have been a lie, or perhap it might have been the truth, but it didn’t matter. Time would tell how that story played itself out, and for now he would instead keep walking, keep hoping and know that he had done as much as he could.

~*~

They had to leave the entire area of the syndicate in order to get far enough into a neutral zone that they would be able to have a conversation without getting the two of them immediately killed on the spot. So what that meant was heading into an open area, with members of the public and normal tourists, or - damn it - even police officers. Then again he was already with a police officer it seemed.  He knew more than anything he would hvae to watch his mouth. Who knew might be here in a place like this. He felt more exposed and out of his depth here than he would feel in a bloody Yakuza casino. At least there he knew he had to watch his back or immediately be killed. Here everything was an unknown and it could be the most stupid thing that caused his downfall.

As soon as Chris had seen where Victor was leading him, he relaxed, this was far more his area, and he knew that Victor couldn’t risk hurting him here, no matter what was said or what came to pass, so his smiles became less forced and more genuine, but after the raid on the club he wouldn’t have been surprised if someone had followed them away from the area. Being anywhere too near a scene of a crime like that would be unwise at best. Well the scene of an un-crime he supposed, but just as bad from his point of view.

Chris and Victor had ordered their drinks - separately because Victor didn’t want to get drugged and he also knew that Chris would suspect the same of him - and had gone to sit outside on the crowded tables that lined the outside of the pub in the night air.

“So…” Chris started, not really knowing what to say, but even in the noise of the bar, and the noise of the people trying to wander back and forth for late night shopping, the silence that had fell between the two of them was going to weigh them down.

“I pray to god that no one else has figured you out yet. I’d had my suspicions for a while now, but you were fucking careless tonight.”

Chris took a deep breath, what for, Victor didn’t care, whether to defend himself, or lie outright, or to say…  _ anything _ absolutely anything. Victor  _ didn’t care _ .

“No,” Victor commanded before Chris could even open his mouth “You never know who is listening, I just want you to know that I know, I’ve been pretty certain about the whole thing for a long time, and that I don’t care. It affects nothing between us, despite it all, you’re one of my few friends in this city, understand? Don’t speak, just nod.”

Chris all but laughed but nodded anyway. His ‘Gin martini’ (just wave the bottle of vermouth somewhere vaguely in the direction of the gin please) sat in front of him getting warm. Or as warm as something could get in London in the middle of winter. 

“Honestly, from the way you talk about this city and… your job, I wouldn’t blame you if you left. No one else would be doing what you’re doing right now.”

“It’s been tempting to leave” Victor admitted, he hadn’t admitted it to many people except from Yuuri, Yuratchka might know, and Georgi might suspect, but it wasn’t usual for him to voice those thoughts aloud, they scared him somewhat. This situation, though, was the perfect excuse to voice all of those fears that had been burdening him for months, years, now. “Frankly, I’m surprised that  _ you’ve  _ survived in the city this long. Maybe I only noticed the pattern because I’m your friend, but there’s only so many times that… something like tonight” He offered in place of describing the raids that there had been on several clubs in the past few years, “Could occur after the employment of a single person, before people start cottoning on that the two might be linked.”

“People are blind to that sort of thing I suppose.”

And that was true, there were all sorts of unexpected backstabs that happened, when you got so deep into the system, people didn’t want to believe that they could be betrayed so easily. It was probably one of the reasons why corrupt cops weren’t killed, arrested or fired more often. Their fellow officers would be too quick to believe that they too were undercover. And the problem with an undercover operation is that the only people who could know the full details of it were the officer in question and their superiors. If Chris knew that there were bribed police officers working the system, then he equally couldn't know if they themselves had been plants, nor could he risk revealing all he knew, because all too quickly it would lead back to him and how he knew so much. So instead Victor hummed, and let the silence cloak them again.

“I’ve been offered other long term positions in other cities, other countries too on... loan I suppose. They think I might have outstayed my welcome here.”

Victor laughed, hollow and empty, the jealousy was building up inside him, Chris would be able to leave, to resettle and live a new life all on taxpayers money, when Victor even voicing the thought that he might want to leave was a one-way ticket to getting hiself shived. “I suspect you might have outstayed your welcome at least two… incidences ago.”

“Well, until someone notices I’m surprisingly settled in one area.” Chris admitted with a shrug. “It would be more suspicious if I were the new person in town trying to get a jobs in shady establishments.”

“You are saying far too much for being this out in the open.” Victor said, softly, but also he knew that it wasn’t his position to care anymore. If Chris was getting out of here anyway, then Victor didn’t have to watch his back, and despite Victor’s paranoia, it didn’t seem like anyone was looking at them, let alone actively listening to them. They were all too busy with their own worlds, their own conversations, their own normal lives.

“I have just one question, and I don’t want details either way, but did you have anything to do with Yuratchka?” He didn’t need to clarify, Chris would know what he meant, Victor had lamented the situation enough to him for the other to understand. It had been his source of pain and fear and anguish for long enough.

Another shake of his head, Victor could have just been lied to, it wouldn’t be the first time when he had been lied to by Chris, but just as before he had known that Chris was hiding something, now he equally knew that Chris had given up the lie. He was caught, so what was the point of pretending any more.

“Not involved in that sort of stuff.” He commented, despite Victor’s warnings that he shouldn’t speak directly about his job he seemed not to care anymore, the gig was up, so what harm was confirming it. “Only vice cases.” 

“God fucking damn it Chris, you can’t say stuff like that out loud. How the hell did you survive this long?” Victor wanted to slam his head on the table in frustration. Chris was not stupid, he wouldn't have been left in the position for so long if he was stupid, but he sense of self-preservation seemed to have gone straight out of the fucking window.

“By making sure I never got to the point where people ask question. I’m not all that good at lying to someone’s face. I’m crap at poker.” 

“I’m never going to see you again am I?” Victor remarked with sudden clarity. There would be no point of staying in the area, and if he continued to work with the understanding that he and Victor had  mutual agreement not to rat each other out, then Chris’s integrity as a cop would be compromised. This was, therefore, the end of it all.  Victor supposed that it was a better end than one that the two of them could have had.

“I wouldn’t be at liberty to disclose much information.” Chris remarked in his best imitation of a robotic monotone, the party line that he had to follow, but Victor knew it now anyway, even if Chris hadn’t just basically confirmed it.

They sat, in the almost quiet and drank their drinks, sipping slowly until they were all but finished. Victor wanted to prolong this moment between them for as long as he could manage, but he knew that there would be no lingering around, Chris had to go and he would have to go now to make sure he got out safely.

“Hey, pick up the tab for me.” He asked with a wink, “I left my wallet at home. I promise to pay you back the next time I see you.”

The  _ if I ever see you again _ went unspoken. Chris leaned forward and left a small gin flavoured kiss on the side of Victor’s mouth, platonic and affectionate, it was the only goodbye that the two of them could voice.

“Be good, kid.” He offered, petting Victor on the top of his head.

“Hey, I’m older than you.” Victor protested, feebly, because he knew absolutely nothing about the real Chris, how old he was, what his life was, who his family was. Chris didn’t confirm or deny this, but winked again, giving a small wave and walking away.

Only once he was completely out of his sight did Victor let himself cry.

He was alone again.

~*~

Chris left the city that night, Victor was certain of it, he didn’t need for it to be confirmed for him to hear the rumours flying already. Whenever there was a big bust like the one that had happened that night there would be a lot of people asking questions, making an inventory of the people who had gone missing, presumed arrested. Chris was on that list, Victor was glad, at least, that people had assumed that Chris had been taken into custody somewhere, at least then he wouldn’t hear too much of people assuming that Chris was somehow involved in the bust. No matter how true it was, he didn’t want to hear it, didn’t want to deal with it.

And once that lose end was tied up, it was one more reason why the city no longer seemed like home. Who did he have here really? Who did he haver here that wanted to be here? Not very many people. That list was small and ever shrinking. The reasons to stay behind were few and far between.

The only reason he could think of was waiting upstairs for him in their shared flat.

Or at least he had assumed that Yuuri was there still in bed waiting for him, the guy had been exhausted, emotionally and physically from a day of pacing around the hospital hoping that the stab wounds had been non-fatal. And even when Victor left Yuuri had been so tired that he hadn’t even twitched a single finger as Victor moved around him getting dressed, he had been all but comatose.

But Yuuri wasn’t in their bed, he didn’t seem to be anywhere in their shared flat, Victor didn’t have to look to far to be certain of this, there was something about the way that the flat felt, as empty and cold as death, when Yuuri wasn’t there. It wasn’t long before Yuuri arrived though, he seemed distressed, he was checking his phone. The only person who he used and talked to regularly on his personal phone was either Victor or Phichit, and he knew that Yuuri wasn’t speaking to him.

Phichit was the Mr. Information, he would have known everything that happened over the course of the day. He hoped that Yuuri had found the answers he was looking for, and that they had brought him the closer that he needed to rest and to recuperate, but he knew from one look at Yuuri’s angry and tired face that it wasn’t the case.

“Where the fuck were you?” Yuuri asked, it wasn’t the question he was expecting, because he had left the note for Yuuri and normally they had a total understanding about the nature of their jobs and responsibilities and what that meant for their unusual sleep schedules and work hours. But Yuuri was furious nevertheless.

“I was on my rounds, I left you a note.” Victor tried to speak calmly and softly, but  he didn’t want to feel like he was patronising or placating, Yuuri seemed upset enough right now, and treating his feelings as invalid would only make matters worse.

“Except it’s all over everywhere. It was even on the news Victor, which this kind of shit never is. The club you did your rounds in was busted, and you are here safe and sound so clearly you didn’t help them nor were you there at the time, so where were you, because I’ve heard some things about what you did today once you left here and I’m scared to even ask you whether you did them.”

“I was on my rounds, I promise. I had some jobs I had to do for Yakov, but then after that I just went about my normal business, but you’re right. The club I was in at the time was busted, Chris led me out the back way and we escaped.”

“Then he wasn’t arrested,” Yuuri looked almost hopeful fo a fraction of a moment, “Is he safe? Where did he go from there? How the hell was he able to get you out of there, he can’t have known that it was going to happen.”

“He did know.” Victor tried to explain, but Yuuri was already starting to put the pieces together, Victor could see the thought forming in his eyes. “Yuuri, Chris was a officer, he was a…”

Yuuri was already one step ahead of him “So where is he now, Victor, God, tell me what you did. Did you do anything, fuck, if Chris is dead… I swear to god Victor I… I…” His hands were over his ears, wanting to block out anything that Victor might say for fear that it would be bad news, but he couldn’t even process enough to listen to what Victor was really trying to say to him. It was only when Victor placed his hands on the side of his face and brought his eyes to meet his that he actually listened.

“Chris is leaving to somewhere,” Victor explained, “I don’t know where and I knew I couldn’t ask. But he’s getting out of this city and I can’t say that I blame him. I don’t know if he’s dead or alive right now, but if he’s anything other than happily getting set up in a new life, it has nothing to do with me. I saw him less than thirty minutes ago, but he was fine then.”

“And the work that you were doing for Yakov?” Yuuri whispered, “The kid was left in the same hospital as Minami so of course we heard all about it. How old was this one, sixteen, seventeen?” 

“He was twenty-two and had been supplying my nephew with heroin.” He wanted to apologise for disturbing Yuuri, for not being good enough at hiding that side of his professional life, but they had already had this conversation once today. They had a job and a life that left them with choices that other people wouldn’t be forced to make. And if he didn’t want to burden Yuuri with that choice, then he was the one who would have to make it.

“I’m going to do things that you are going to hate me for when I’m doing work for Yakov, but I won’t have a choice. Not in this, not in being Victor Nikiforov for at least this long. And Chris leaving… it’s got me thinking about this all over again. You don’t need someone as fucked up as me. You need someone who is normal to help you with all your own mess, not someone who just brings more mess and complication to your life. If I can’t get to the bottom of this who situation with Yuratchka and Yakov within the next few weeks, I’m going to take responsibility for this… bad that I’m bringing into your life. I’ll pack up my things and leave this place to you. If you’re working so hard to get out then I have no right to stand in your way.”

He thought, maybe, that Yuuri had listened to him. His head was hung low, and defeat was written in the lines of his shoulders, but then when they started shaking, he knew he had done nothing but make him cry. He wanted to speak again as soon as he saw that pain, but he had no idea of what to say. He couldn’t take what he had said back especially if in the end it was for the greater good. But then, Yuuri spoke.

“Bullshit.” he pushed out shakingly between tears. “That’s all just bullshit.”

“Yuuri… I…” Victor began, but the words got caught in his throat. 

“Like fuck you’ll stay away for my own good.” Yuuri started to yell, putting everything that had hurt him over the past couple of days into every word. “I  _ know _ who you are, Victor. You know who _ I _ am. You think I haven’t killed people too, hurt people more than they deserved? Do you see me trying to turn you away at every available opportunity? If you don’t want to be with me then don’t be with me because of that, because of our relationship. But if you’re going to spout some cliche vampire bullshit about not being together for our safety then you can go fuck yourself. I know that we’re in a tough spot. I know that staying together will probably get us both killed. I just need  _ you _ to believe in me more than I believe in me right now. I need you to believe in us and tell me that whatever happens we can make it. Can you do that and not act like you’re being selfless by ‘letting me go’? Because I can tell you now; you’re not being selfless. You’re being as selfish as they come. So you can just fuck right off and stay with me.”

“I think that last statement might have been contradictory.” Victor said, finding, against reason since it was his own stupid fault, that he was crying now too.

“Shut up,” Yuuri said, softly, all the fight that he’d crumbled in on himself ever so slightly, instead of letting himself fall apart, he curled himself into Victor’s space, arms around his waist and face buried into his chest, he had confessed to Victor once that letting himself be surrounded by someone he loved like this made him feel small and cared for, so there was nothing that Victor would do or want to do, than wrap his arms around Yuuri in turn, tucking him in even closer.

He wanted to say sorry, he  _ would _ say sorry eventually, but now they needed to be still and at peace for one second out of this terrible insane day. It was almost one am and they needed to just rest.

“Bed?” Victor asked, not bothering to pull back from the embrace,

“I don’t know,” Yuuri mumbled, against his shirt “Are you  done being stupid?”

“I’m done being stupid. Sorry.” Victor agreed quietly kissing the top of Yuuri’s head, the only place he could reasonably reach when Yuuri was in octopus mode.

“Okay then,”

~*~

It was only much later, when they were on the verge of sleep that Yuuri murmured something to really make Victor take note.

“Are you looking for the case?” he asked, so quietly Victor wasn’t sure whether he was actually supposed to be answering the question.

“Case?”

“I’m surprised that your lot haven’t been looking for it, it might help you with your own trade. There’s some case that’s gone missing, Triad probably, or maybe Firm, but it’s worth a lot.”

“Define a lot,” Victor was starting to remember Yakov’s additional instructions, his suggestion that as he was going around and asking questions about Yuri any way, that he might spend some time looking for a missing case of goods.

“Enough,” Yuuri was vague, but Victor knew what he meant. Enough to escape, enough for freedom. People might say that you can’t put a price on freedom, but Victor had to disagree, it was the price of a one way ticket, a fake passport and a house on the continent.

“I’ve been told to look for it if I can.” 

“Can you…” Yuuri turned towards him making sure he could see Victor’s face, Victor pushed strands of hair away from his face, “Can you not look too hard?”

“Wouldn’t it be better if were were both looking?”

“But I know what will happen if Yakov gets wind that you’re looking for it properly, he’ll expect results and he’ll expect the money to go to him. It’ll be easier to deny that you’ve just got other things to be working on if you don’t have anything to lie about. Just, if you hear something let me know. Please?”

“I’m just letting you know that I don’t like this, everyone will be looking for it. How the hell will you even manage to sell it without getting yourself killed?”

“I’ll take it up north, drop it off at Moss Side or something, I won’t get as much for it up there, but at least… fuck if I know what I’m doing here Victor. It’s all hypothetical right now. I might not even find it, if it really does belong to the Triads then there’ll already be way too many people looking for it. It’s just a thought, an idea.”

Victor continued to stroke his thumb along the ridge of Yuuri’s cheekbone, “Okay, for now I’ll stay out of it, but the second, the very second you think things might be getting too deep, let me in. If you don’t want me to walk away for your safety, then grant me the same courtesy. If you say that we’re in this together then that has to go both ways. Promise?”

“Promise,” the word came out in almost a breath, barely there, but they held everything that Victor needed to hear at that moment as sleep overtook the both of them.   
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This will be finished. This will definitely be finished. I'm just rubbish at writing quickly and real life is too busy.
> 
> Also, YOI stands for Young Offender's Institute, I found the fact that the letters are the same was quite entertaining to me.


End file.
